


Philoi

by Softgem



Category: Tenet (2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Contract Killers, English translation, M/M, chapter-specific warnings will be placed in the beginning note of the chapter in question
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:28:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 42,810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28027050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Softgem/pseuds/Softgem
Summary: “In this city,” I said. “There’s another killer, but I’ve never met him.”“Then how do you know him?”“Because,” I paused despite myself. “We exchanged guns.”An English translation ofPhiloiby Knott.
Relationships: the Protagonist/Neil
Comments: 77
Kudos: 72





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Philoi](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27837931) by [Knott](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Knott/pseuds/Knott). 



“In this city,” I said. “There’s another killer, but I’ve never met him.”

“Then how do you know him?”

“Because,” I paused despite myself. “We exchanged guns.”

“You must be kidding me.”

“No, I wasn’t,” I said. “In fact, we exchanged every gun we used for every job we’d done. It's how I know the person – through the toys he sent. Since the first exchange, I’ve known this guy for almost ten years.”

“Alright,” the FBI sitting across from me said, the corner of his mouth twitching, as if to tell me just how ludicrous this story was, but the pen in his hand did not stop, nor did the tape in the recorder – it was turning forward gently and untiringly, like time itself – “from the beginning. Come on, open my eyes: how did it begin?”

“You don’t believe me.” I pointed out evenly.

He shrugged. “Not that I don’t believe you, but killing is a loner’s job. In New York no more than three people can recognize you. I’m one of them, and the other two – I guess there’s no need to tell you what happened to the other two.”

I slowly smiled at him. “You can’t prove, Ives,” I said, “you can’t prove what happened to the other two.”

“Enough,” Ives stopped me, his voice stiff with annoyance, “go on with your story. Mind you, a New Yorker billionaire was killed last night and you’re the only suspect. If you don’t want to be in jail for the rest of your life, you’d better have a believable story there – to make us think Mr Sutherland was killed by another person, you have to give us some evidence. Otherwise you’re done.”

“Oh.” I took a sip from the coffee cup, and said, “where was I?”

“You became pen-pals with a killer you’d never met, or whatever,” Ives knocked on the table with a pen cap, “You mean, you got to know a fellow in your business and you regularly exchanged little souvenirs of death – don’t interrupt me – then Michael Sutherland was dead, and bang! You decided at once to throw your old friend under the bus and pour a ten-year friendship down the drain?”

“I never said it was friendship,” I said.

“Come again?” Ives frowned, as if what I just said made no sense to him.

“I never said it was friendship,” I repeated, leaning back in my chair. “Can I have a cigarette?”

Ives glared at me. Now it was my turn to shrug. He pulled aside the chair and stood, whispered something to a patrol, who pushed the door open. A moment later, a pack of Lucky Strike arrived along with a lighter; Ives pushed the pack to me but gripped the lighter in his own hand. I held a cigarette in my mouth, and he lit the lighter with a pop, deliberately raising it high enough so I was forced to lean in and reach up. It’d been years, actually, since I last smoked; the first inhale made me choke desperately, almost dropping the cigarette, and I hurried to catch it with my cuffed hand. Ives sank down in his chair aslant, a spare hand spinning the lighter, and looked at me coldly.

“You’re out of your depth here,” Ives said. “Michael Sutherland? You can’t touch him. You’re in big trouble.”

“I know what I’m doing,” I said.

“’Course you do,” Ives laughed sarcastically. “The one we’re looking for is injured in their right shoulder, and it isn’t a minor injury. Are you showing me this by having a cigarette? That you don’t have any wounds in your shoulders, so you’re not the man we want?”

I pursed my lips and smoked, and only answered after I blew it out. “You don’t want to know about the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, then?”

“What hummingbird?” The hand spinning the lighter stopped.

“His codename,” I said. “The alias that the other one uses when he's on a mission. You know nothing about the codename, which means he’s never screwed up once, so there’s nothing about him in Federal Databases, which means – I’m your only hope that you’ll get him.”

“Let’s just say I’m intrigued,” Ives said, “but I’ll probably regret it afterwards. Now, prove to me this isn’t a lie – before those bastards come and transfer you to another team, you have half an hour.”

I said nothing for a moment, then put out the cigarette. I had to think it all over before telling this story properly. “About ten years ago, I was new to the business, arrogant, always thought I was the best. I had my reasons: no one ever caught me, and I never failed,” Ives opened his mouth to say something, but I shook my head to stop him. “But that day – I remembered clearly: it was 24 July, Yankee versus Boston Red Sox, Jorge Posada saved the game and made it a tie – I did. An unusual night; I broke into the hotel room to find someone was ahead of me, had left the body on the bed as if mocking me. Professionally done, really neat, even I couldn’t find anything inappropriate. I searched the room from top to bottom and found nothing, except a tiny hummingbird – a mark on the corpse, left by the cameo on a ring; that was his signature.”

I stopped and waited for questions. Ives gestured to tell me to keep going.

“I was in a bad mood. After coming out of the hotel, I went to a bar.” that night eidetically came back to my mind, “I never drink on the job, but since the mission had failed, it didn’t matter anymore; so I said to myself to hell with that.”

Ives let out a laugh, which I ignored. “I asked for a drink, and sat down to watch the game. There were lots of people there, their eyes were all fixed on the TV. A thought was haunting me: maybe that guy was still around; but I didn’t even know who he was, so how could I find him? I finished the beer, walked out the bar all sullen, and then realized we’d already met.”

“He was also in the bar,” Ives said.

“The moment I stepped out of the bar, I remembered one thing –” I nodded. “there was a man with his back to me the whole time. No one’d seen his face; no one’d talked to him. I stayed inside for half an hour, and not a face escaped me but his.”

A hint of smile formed at the corner of Ives’s mouth. “That was how you knew he was the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird?”

“No more knowing than suspecting,” I said, “he kept his back to me; seemed intentional. I’m not some ordinary observer; I’m trained; it’s not as easy as you think to escape my eye, but this person did it effortlessly. I went back into the bar, but the figure in the corner had disappeared – and I knew my cover was blown. Maybe he didn’t have my name yet, didn’t memorize my face, but he had known what I did for a living. He saw through me, too.”

“Go on,” Ives said.

“Going back to the bar was the second mistake I made,” I said, “as he took the upper hand in the meantime. Because if we were the same kind, he’d do what I would do: to kill me. The plan had to be changed; I couldn’t use this cover anymore. I went to an apartment, having made sure no one was following. It was past midnight, and I reached into the place where I hid my stuff – guns, cash, and forged passports – and discovered someone had been there, and left a souvenir as well.”

Ives nodded with understanding. “A gun,” he said.

“not _a_ gun – the gun that had been used hours ago. A bullet from its chamber was still in the target’s body.”

“Wait. Hold on,” Ives held up one hand to protest. “you couldn’t know that.”

“You know the women you slept with,” I paused meaningfully. “I know guns.”

Ives raised an eyebrow at that. “Stop the tasteless jokes. Get to the point.”

“Yeah, a gun –” I pondered, then nodded to myself. “– someone like you only has two kinds of friends: guns and bullets. The last person in this position said that. Michael, I think you know him.”

“Of course I know him,” Ives said. “He’s the fucking director now, my direct superior. Fuck _Michael_ , you should call him Sir Crosby. Slow down with your story, Stanley, you haven’t told me what the gun was like.”

I shook my head. “You won’t believe me.”

“Try and make me,” Ives said. “just tell me: what was the gun like?”

  
_**2003** _

_It was the most ordinary-looking gun in the world, and it was lying in his palms. He was kneeling on the floor in the cheap apartment, knees in immediate contact with the ice-cold cement, thinking what this should mean. He’d heard about the person, but never really met him. Now, after the accidental encounter in the bar, said person decided to leave him a souvenir; not any souvenir, but a murder weapon. He held the gun, putting it in his hands, weighing it up. The gloves were still on, pressed tightly against his skin, against his sweat; it was made of rubber, to prevent him from leaving fingerprints at the scene. The gun was a common model. He raised the muzzle of the gun and smelled it. The residual scent of gunpowder entered his nostril, just a faint lingering warmth. Something seemed missing from this model-made object, and it took him some time to remember the answer: the silencer. The other one must have taken the silencer with himself, only leaving the gun to him. The thing shimmered coldly in the dark. He took the magazine out, looked at it, and put it back in. It was full._

_Kneeling in darkness, he was lost and puzzled for a second. For inculpation, this was too overt, and for a threat too insubstantial. There was no blood or brain matters on the gun. The best move would be to put it back where it was. His mind urged him to do so, but then in his head he saw that figure again. An unanticipated impulse made him hold his breath. He got rid of his gloves with haste, and held up the gun, index finger on the trigger, palm around the grip. The tight, sudden grasp pressed the shape of the gun into his palm. At this moment he saw it, a spark of blood stain, dark red, already dry, thrusting into his view and spreading across it. Imagining what had once taken place in the room, his breath became rasped involuntarily, his wrist, bare the second before, now heavy with a tremendous weight. If this was not an inculpation, not a threat, nor an accident._

_He thought of another possibility._

_He tucked the pistol into the back of his waistband and left his own. It was a Browning Hi-Power that he had been carrying with him for a while. It was for backup, and therefore ballistically hadn’t had a record yet. He turned the box where he kept the cash and passports upside down to empty it, put in the Browning, locked the combination lock, shoved it under the movable tile. Then, he stood up, dusted off his hands, and tested the evenness of the tile with his foot. His gift was a dated one, and not the most expensive service weapon in the world, but it had been with him through some narrow escapes nonetheless. If – that possibility did exist – this gun would then be his word, and the complete set of twelve bullets in it would carry it for him. That person would understand the implications._

“And then?” Ives said.

“After a week, someone did a job with that Browning,” I said, “in Munich. You never find the murderer.”

Ives said nothing.

“I knew it was him,” I said, “the firearm, the M.O., and the mark. That was his counterattack, and then it was mine. letting a stranger touch your sidearm, there’s some inexplicable intimacy in it, to let each other choose the weapon for you – it’s madness.”

“Then,” Ives said, “then if it’s madness, why did you agree to play the game?”

He saw something in my eyes. He sighed, as if he was fed up with my life choices.

“No,” he said.

“Yes,” I said. “Because he’s the only one who tried, and the only one who tried and got away with it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I finally worked up the courage and asked for permission to translate this fic and here I am! The original work has its beauty that I could't possibly fully restore in this translation. I wish I wouldn't butcher this up too much but I'm not a native speaker, so while I'll try my best, any help with the translation will be deeply appreciated.
> 
> (original footnote:) Philoi is a word that roughly translates to "friend." The type of friendship is based on the characteristically Greek value for reciprocity as opposed to a friendship that exists as an end to itself.


	2. Chapter 2

“We’ve narrowed it down to eight people,” Ives said. “Height, colour of hair, whereabouts, all fit your description. Lucky for you, five out of eight had criminal records, and every one of them have been picked up at least once by security cameras. I’ve got their photos from the database. Here, any familiar faces?”

Ives held the deck of photos with one hand. He turned his wrist, palm down, and impeccably imitated a dealing. Photos spread on the tabletop like cards; faces of strangers revealed before my eyes. But I didn’t look at them.

“The one you’re looking for won’t be captured by cameras,” I told Ives. “He’s too smart for that.”

“No one’s that smart,” Ives countered. “If there’s an offence, there’s a record.”

“Not for him,” I said firmly. “Once, he told me by chance why he chose that codename. Do you know? Hummingbirds are the only birds in the world that can fly backwards; the ruby-throat is the most common species. It can enter a state of torpor, similar to hibernation. It lives an extremely short life but moves fast. Its metabolism is the fastest of all animals.”

“You have fifteen minutes left to convince me of this story, and you choose to talk about birds for a third of it? This ain’t National Geographic; this is a murder investigation. Lecturing on hummingbird habits won’t get you off.”

I stared at him for a long while, and said nothing.

“Alright,” Ives said, impatient, “even if you can tell me everything about the hummingbird, what does this have to do with the guy we’re looking for?”

“It says something about the person himself,” I said, “lets out some information about him. Don’t you see by now? People like us never choose anything at random. He chose the hummingbird, not the other way around. Everything’s connected.”

Ives inspected me, and shook his head. “You know what I think? You’re messing with me. Every word you’ve said since you sat down is a lie. He told you, huh? Ten minutes ago, you said you never met, and now you want me to believe you talk about everything. If you’ve never met him, how did you get to talk? And he offered to tell you about his codename?”

I looked at him; he frowned and searched my face, as if my eyes were telling an answer he didn’t like.

“… You’ll think I’m a pervert,” I said hoarsely.

Ives pushed back the chair and leaned backwards, putting some distance between us. I wanted to say something; he gestured sternly to make me stop. He stood, walked around the corner of the table for several steps, and only then did he come back to me. He reached a hand to the recorder. I saw that pinky-ringed hand press a button, stay for two seconds, and return to the side of the table. The tape stopped turning; Ives shot me a disapproving look. He tugged at the tie knot around his neck, as if the tie had suddenly become too tight.

I spoke again, as if I was never interrupted. “Once you know a person’s gun, you know the person. And if the situation continues for a while – say, ten years – you get to know everything about them.”

“Nonsense,” Ives said immediately.

I didn’t argue. “Show me your gun,” I said.

Ives looked at me warily; I grinned, and waved my handcuffs at him. His arms fell to his waist and flung backwards, pulling up his coat to reveal the gun on his waistband. Ives remained seated, one elbow raised, palm on thigh. I glanced at his gun. He snorted contemptuously; his coat fell back again, covering the once half-revealed barrel and grip.

“A snubbie revolver,” I smiled at him deliberately. “The gun plainclothes prefer. Easy to carry, very covert, its owner doesn’t like a high-profile appearance, and prefers a low-key, subtle solution. If you pulled out an MEU semi-auto, it would tell me you were once in USMC, and also spent some time in the police. But I’d guess the revolver’s just a backup; your main gun is the MEU.”

“Not bad,” Ives said. “But everyone who’s seen my files can say that. Is that all you have?”

“Also,” I said. “This is not your gun.”

“Bullshit,” Ives said.

“This is not your gun,” I said. “I could be a little conceited and assume you didn’t bring your own gun because you’d expected this conversation, but you’re not a quitter. You can’t bring your own gun because it’s missing.”

“Shut up,” Ives snapped. “This is not about me. it’s about you. You guys exchanged more than guns, didn’t you?”

I pursed my lips and refused to answer the question. “How did he _tell you by chance_?” Ives said slowly, “How was it _let out_? You’re not answering? Admit it, you guys have met. You know who he is. You’re just lying.”

This show of you-lied-to-me he put on didn’t interest me as much as what was going on with the inconsistency. I’d known Ives for a long time, he was not that shallow. Though he often acted like an opponent that could be fooled, I knew he wasn’t.

“What?” Perhaps because I was silent for too long, Ives spoke.

“You’re acting very weird today,” I said, “One minute ago you didn’t believe he existed, and now you want me to confess I’ve seen him. This gun show, this conversation, and this place, there’s something wrong with all of this. Where are the people who’re going to take me? What are you hiding? What’s with the half an hour limit? Let me guess – you have another suspect, in another room. You want to see who gives in first, and who’s lying.”

“Nonsense,” He scoffed.

“Is it?”

“Seems I’ve been too gracious,” he said, reaching for the recorder. “The little yard time is over, Mr Killer.”

“Wait,” I said the moment before he could press the button. “You want to know what else we exchanged? You can’t hear it once you press down the button, and I’m not sure your boss would like to hear it. Listen, I never saw this person’s face, but I had sex with him.”

Ives shook his head. “You’re full of bullshit,” he said, “if it weren’t that you saved my life –”

“I know what you think,” I didn’t wait for the rest of it and interrupted, “but it’s true.”

Ives studied me, disapproval written over his face. “Go on.”

“It escalated,” I said. “First we exchanged guns, then targets, then sexual partners, and finally bodies, as in –” I stopped, deliberately ignoring Ives’s reaction, “– sex.”

“I’m listening.”

I thought about what I just said. “Yeah,” I nodded, “if there’s really another person in another room, you can tell him I said this. I left my Browning to him, and I had to accomplish the next mission using his gun.”

Ives sat up straight and started the cassette recorder.

“What did you do, then?” Ives asked.

I did not immediately answer. “You know what it means to let someone else assign your weapon?” I smiled at him, though his eyes were completely unimpressed by the smile. “Everything will revolve around it – the target, the technique, the timing, and the route of escape. The gun had a limited range, which meant my choice of targets became extremely limited; without the silencer, it would be too loud, which meant I had to choose carefully where I should strike.”

Ives listened, increasingly keen. He wanted to say something; I raised a hand to stop him.

“After I’d decided to use this gun in my next job, after I’d decided to accept the invitation from this stranger,” I said as I thought back about it, “I knew I had to make a plan around it. You know, this gun, he didn’t just pick it on a whim, the choice was completely deliberate. The smartass, he was challenging me.”

“How?” Ives asked.

“The gun he left to me was close ranged, deadly enough, but not subtle. Sure, it had twelve bullets, but I’d be in danger of exposure after the first shot, and my chances of escape would be long gone if I had to fire a second shot. If I wanted to kill a person with it – if, mind you – I had to be close up enough, and I only had one chance.”

Ives was waiting for me to continue, but I was silent after that. He glanced up at me; the pen in his hand stopped on the piece of paper.

“So, I was more picky than usual that time,” I nodded. “It took me more than three weeks to figure out who my next target should be.”

Ives smiled. “And who was it?” He asked.

I grinned. “You’ll never know,” I said. “I’m not desperate enough to start giving names, Ives.”

“Let me put it another way,” Ives gave me a wink, “what kind of person did you choose, Mr Stanley?”

“That’s better,” I flashed my teeth at him unabashed. A prisoner being interrogated probably shouldn’t be so cocky, but hell, I was already here. “You asked the wrong questions, Ives, and that’s why you can’t climb up. It’s not about what kind of person I chose, but about what the other side – my fellow – really wanted.”

“What do you mean?”

“It took me three weeks to realize,” I said, “the reason why he assigned me this particular gun, was that he wanted to see me from up close. I’m not talking about face-to-face _seeing_. It’s just a figure of speech. Before meeting him, I’d never shot someone point-blank. It’s too close, too risky, too much exposure, you see? I preferred a sniper rifle – ensure the distance, take one shot, and retreat at leisure. But this guy, he wanted me to expose myself. He knew there was only one way to shoot the gun; he was trying to push me closer to my target, or rather, to him. After I finished, he would see me, through the scene I left. The _seeing_ would also be point-blank.”

“I have a feeling,” Ives mused, “that what I’m about to hear is going to be interesting.”

“So I said to myself, fuck it, you wanna see me, don't you? Then I’ll let you.” I shrugged. “I could play it the safe way, but I went for the opposite. Someone wanted to hire a killer to take out an arms dealer. He was allergic to multiple chemicals; If I didn’t want to give myself away, I couldn’t use cologne, couldn’t shower, couldn’t leave a single fibre of cloth on my skin, couldn’t even wear clothes. The man who hired me was his sworn enemy, and he wanted to see this man die from a bullet, not an allergy. That’s why no one was taking up this tricky job. Ring any bells?”

“Thomas Blackburn,” Ives said. “That was you? The intelligence agency in Britain had their suspicion, but they couldn’t find evidence.”

“No comment,” I said. “Anyway, not only did I take the job, I completed it. I had no intention of keeping it low-profile; on the contrary, I went way over the top. Only the person who gave me the gun understood how I did it, and he’d be really surprised.”

“Come on, don’t keep me guessing,” Ives said. “How did you do it?”

“Not only was I close to the guy, I was naked,” I said. “And by that I mean without a single towel. The gun had been hidden there; all I had to do was to get it, get past the guy’s bodyguards, get to him from behind, and make sure I was close enough and he didn’t notice a thing. It went well. I only used one bullet – I did it in a Turkish bath.”

Ives laughed in disbelief. “You arrogant bastard,” he said.

“When it made the newspapers,” I explained, “Mr Hummingbird would see every step I made, as if it was him who did it. They couldn’t find the murderer, but they did find out the weapon, and this he would know as well. I met his requirements, which meant I was qualified for the game. I don’t know how long after that, a week or so, I was living a quiet life in a small town – people there thought I was a plumber – when I received a postcard from nowhere, and on it was –”

“A nectar-sucking hummingbird,” Ives said. “Am I right?”

I nodded. “That was how we connected,” I said. “Every time, the postcards had a different species of hummingbird on them. And the most recent place of discovery for this particular species – you know how there’s always someone posting this kind of stuff on the internet? The Birding Association or something – that was where we swapped our guns. But that first time, when I got the postcard, it hadn’t been established yet. I just sent back the gun to the address on the postcard. It was completely instinctive, the first thing that came to my mind.”

“And that’s it?” Ives looked at me sceptically, “you just sent back the gun untouched?”

“Oh,” I replied, “I lubricated that gun.”

“You what?”

“You see, I went through the whole maintenance routine,” I said, “the usual stuff – disassembling, cleaning the bore, applying lube, making sure the spring and the rifling were not worn away. But I put into it a bit more care – I lubricated that gun.”

“Stanley,” Ives’s expression was still shocked, “I don’t remember if I’ve told you this before, but you’re a dirty bastard.”

“Thanks,” I replied.

_**The first exchange** _

_He did. It was a job that required precision, so he took it slow. He picked a night when he was alone, and sat down beside the workbench in his basement to do his job. He liked to disassemble guns. He could always find some comfort in doing this in silence, especially after an intense mission. The model was tricky to deal with, like its owner; to open it, he needed to find the exact groove, twist it from left to right, and push it out tenderly – his finger touched the latch. Once it was removed, the slide could come off the body of the gun. “You’re hard to find, aren’t you?” He plucked the latch as he mumbled to himself. it was leaning against the tabletop like a huge copper nail, rolling under his finger pad. He took out the spring and the guide rod with care. After the rod had loosened, the barrel became bare. It was the last position, the rifling clear and complete, as if telling him the history of this gift. He spread out all the parts on the table, and took some time to scrutinize them. The other one had done the same thing as he, one could tell from these components._

_This gun was well maintained._

_He dipped the brush into the cleaning solvent and wiped down every exposed surface. The trigger, the firing mechanism, and the magazine, one at a time, then moving to the next, until every part was spotless. When it came to the barrel, he thrusted his wire brush deep into the bore. The residue of gunpowder instantly greyed the brush, its coarse bristles rubbing against his fingers. But he did not pick up the pace. His motive for cleaning this little thing before sending it back was not to erase the evidence; quite the opposite. To reach into another man’s bore like this, it was almost teasing. He needed to wet one end of the brush with the solvent, no more than a few drops, then smoothly and meticulously work it into the narrow interior of the barrel, all the way to the deepest end, so that the solvent touched every inch of the bore wall; then, pausing for a moment, he rotated his wrist – the soot would cling between the bristles. He took it out gently, and repeated, until the brush became clean. Would that guy gasp, or go into a rage? For a brief moment he allowed himself to wonder._

_At last, he spread a layer of lubricant on the surface of the metal, smoothing it out. Just a thin layer, and the moving parts started to glow again. His fingers brushed over two bottles of gun oil, but finally settled on the one with the stronger smell. He wanted to announce his presence to another person, to force the scent into the other’s sleep; it would not be gone even after a few days, and, after that, would make the person think of the secret and murder that tied them together – now, he could start to reassemble the gun backwards._

“When did he write back?” Ives shook his head, “can’t believe I said that. _Write back_ , what the fuck.”

“Oh, not so long after,” I didn’t even think about it. “He sent back my gun, too. You remember it? The Browning?”

“I wish I could forget,” Ives said in all seriousness, rolling his eyes at me. “You messed with his gun, and his only response was to obediently send your toy back? I mean, as a fellow of yours, that was a little too forgiving.”

“There’s nothing obedient about him,” I was amused. “You know what he did? He sanded off the serial number on my gun.”

Ives sucked in a breath, as if what I just described was giving him a toothache. “Yeah,” I said. “I didn’t know how he’d done it – several methods come to mind – but he did erase the serial number completely. Where the number had been was bare, and felt scratchy. It was absolutely not unintended – he could have sanded the area smooth, but he wanted me to feel it. It was a comeback to me for lubricating _his_ gun. He basically threw it in my face.”

“I think he did the right thing.”

“Yes, of course you’d say that,” I didn’t take Ives’s response seriously. “That was the first exchange. Now, do you believe there’s such a man? It’s been exactly half an hour. What’s your decision? Pass me over to those hounds, or keep listening?”

Ives lifted his wrist to check his watch and sighed. “Damn,” he said. “Guess I fell for your trick. Go on.”

But I didn’t immediately go on. “Answer me a question,” I said, “and I’ll finish my story. In another room, is there someone being interrogated as I am? You don’t need to tell me who; just yes or no.”

“– Yes,” Ives said, exasperated.


	3. Chapter 3

Ives opened his can of beer, and pushed the diet coke I asked for across the table.

“Thanks,” I said. Opening a can when handcuffed wasn’t easy, but I’d got the hang of it these days.

“Stuff from the vending machine, no need to thank me,” Ives said. “But you owe me five dollars.”

“I’ll pay it,” I opened the can with a pop, and flashed the ring at him, “when I get out of here.”

Ives snorted with some contempt. “You know, I can’t understand you,” he said. “Of course, the top-tier killers make decent money, some can even afford to be extravagant. I know some people, they go skiing in Switzerland every year, they sign up at yacht clubs under aliases, but you’re not one of them. You don’t splurge. You don’t gamble, don’t do drugs. In fact, you wear the same clothes for a decade, choose a small town to settle down every time; the place you live is leaky, and everyone who knows you thinks you’re a plumber. Not for money, not for women – then why do this for a living?”

“The guys you’re talking about, I know them, too,” I said unhurriedly, matter-of-fact. “And they’re all in jail right now.”

“So you’re living your life like this to stay out of it?” Ives said. “That’s a lot of sacrifice.”

I thought about it carefully. “No,” I said. “It’s only a habit: try not to bring in someone else. It’s my decision to live like this. There’s no need to make others pay for it. In our business, involvements are risky; you know it, too. If I had the habits you were talking about, and thought about how to have fun all the time, I’d be dead a long while ago.”

“Even so, you don’t need to do this,” he said. “With your ability, all the security companies will be fighting over you.”

“I bet you gave the same lecture to the other guy,” I said. “What was his response? Let me guess. He wouldn’t tell you to fuck yourself, ’cause he hasn’t known you long enough, and – he hasn’t been through enough other’s bullshit.”

Ives laughed. “Good strategy,” he said. “I’ll tell you again: No matter how hard you try, you won’t get any information from me about this other person. Just give it up, old friend, and think more about the trouble you’re in now.”

“I’m thinking,” I answered. “What do you want today? I’m ready.”

“Tell me about the second exchange,” Ives said.

“Not until six months after did the second exchange take place,” I said, “I don’t know why. Perhaps he was stuck in the middle of something, perhaps he got into some kind of trouble, perhaps he was handed over an exceptionally tricky mission that took a very long time. One possibility I did consider was prison. All the people arrested around that time, as long as they were in the business, I checked; but none of them seemed to be the one I was looking for. Either the age was not right, or the M.O. didn’t fit. I had searched everywhere I could think of, and I’d expose myself if I looked further. So I had to give up.”

Ives stopped writing and looked up at me. I didn’t wait for his next question to come.

“And I decided to change my life,” I said, “in the next six months I advanced myself. I brought a second-hand tractor, lived in it, and regularly went training in the gun range. I learnt to dive; I even hired a paragliding instructor. I learnt to fly a small plane. I stopped taking all the work I could get, and instead focused on whether I could learn anything from the commission. I was pickier and pickier, and jobs that came to me became fewer and fewer, and eventually, almost none.”

“But you’d changed,” Ives cut in, “I mean, to the better.”

“Fewer people came to me,” I told him, “but the price they offered was higher every time. Soon I realized I could get three to five times more than before from one job, so I didn’t need to do it as often to make ends meet. So I became selective in the jobs I took– and I gave up drinking; if I still used to drink a little when I wasn’t on job before, I had completely quitted it by then. I stopped meeting my clients in person, and I didn’t let them come to me directly. I found a job, made sure I could plausibly explain most of the money I made. I rented a safe box, hired a lawyer, fuck, I even started to pay taxes.”

“If I remember correctly,” Ives reminded me placidly, “it was about then you caught our attention. The ones you kill were no longer nobodies, Stanley, so you couldn’t expect people to simply forget about you anymore. In this city there was a new killer, a nasty one we couldn’t seem to catch, they said. No one knew what he looked like, only the codename he used – The Protagonist – and you’ve been unchallenged ever since then, right?”

“Just learnt to avoid risks,” I made a funny face at him. “I’d always relied on my skills, and lived the life as I wanted, never really thought about the future, or what’d happen if I failed. I got a job, I took it. Never thought about it too much. The guy in the bar gave me a kick in the head and sobered me up; I understood that I was far from the best, and the life I once lived was childish and ridiculous. He’s not below me, but far more cautious, apparently.”

“Can’t tell if it was a good thing or a bad thing for you,” Ives said, “and then?”

“Just when I’d changed myself entirely and settled down,” I paused. “I got the second postcard.”

“Ha,” Ives replied drily. “Just the right time, for you.”

“The only thing on the postcard was a website address,” I ignored his sarcasm. “I opened the site, and it was dedicated to recording the migration sites of hummingbirds. The page I was on was a map. There was a log-in box at the top of the page; after some thought I entered the username _hummingbird_ , and the date we first met as the password. I was logged in, and on the page of my personal account was another map, exactly the same as the previous one. But other than the little red dots, someone added some blue dots on it as well. I moved the mouse over the first blue dots – time, coordinates and species showed up.”

“Clever,” Ives commented.

“Very,” I agreed. “And well hidden, too. If the species was the same as that on the postcard, the meeting could go as planned. If not, he was telling me something went wrong – I’d delete the account at once, erase any trace that could suggest our contact, and change my identity. And he would do the same. Of course, the exchange would also be cancelled.”

Ives nodded thoughtfully. “Tell me about the exchange,” he said,

“Well, I drove there,” I said. “Because I wasn’t sure what would happen, I took some precautions before I left – the ones you can think of. The car was hired under an alias, the hotel was booked under another. I filled the car with fuel, and checked the GPS system beforehand. Don’t look at me like that, you would’ve done it if you were me.”

“I don’t think so,” Ives said. “You guys are a paranoid lot, aren’t you?”

“Paranoia can save my life,” I grinned, “oh, and the car was a family coach, you can easily fit an adult into the trunk, and that’s a conservative estimate. I also brought ropes, a shovel and a flashlight – just kidding.”

“Fuck, you almost had me,” Ives clicked his tongue. “I really don’t know if I should be happy if you killed this guy.”

I looked at him in confusion.

“You sound like you need a friend,” he said. “Everyone does. I don’t know, sometimes I think maybe it’s a good thing you found each other. This guy was like your stabilizer or something, something that stopped you from catalyzing.”

“You mean –”

“He gave you a pull,” Ives said bluntly, “kept your violent side in control. There’s always some kind of instability in you. If this guy hadn’t shown up, you’d probably become another guy out of control. I’ve seen a lot of people like you, some even more skilled than you are, and they all got lost in the end. Aimless lives made them lose their directions. They’d take jobs that were more than they could handle, and go for excessive and unnecessary violence just for the thrill.”

I gave him a glance. “You’re a nice guy, Ives,” I said. “For someone in your business, you even have some conscience.”

The corner of his mouth twitched. “Thank you,” he said sardonically.

“But don’t talk like that again, unless you know what you’re talking about,” I told him calmly. “Anyhow, after a two-hour drive, I was at the place. It was a parking lot; across from it was a very normal-looking fast food restaurant. I parked the car and went to get myself a burger. When I came back, the car was still there, no signs of being moved. I opened the car door and sat down, looked at myself in the mirror, and took a deep breath. The parking lot was still filled with cars; it was difficult to tell which belonged to the guy I was looking for. I put the bag on the passenger seat, opened the glovebox, and someone’d already took away the thing in it.”

Ives gestured me to stop, so that he could finish the last few words.

“Now, an envelope was lying in the box,” I paused, looking at my own interlocking fingers. “I didn’t even need to open it to see what could be inside. I was quite sure I’d locked the car when I got out, but it didn’t seem to be a problem for the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird. It was already the third time – the combination lock in my apartment was the first, that safe in Munich was the second, and my car was the third. Apart from being a killer, our Mr Hummingbird was an excellent locksmith.”

“The gun was stolen.” Ives hazarded a guess.

“Probably,” I said, “but it was not anything helpful to me. There were tons of cases of gun thefts, and you and I both know some of those victims would never report the loss – either the guns were never legally licensed, or they were involved in other cases. Tracing the gun would be like looking for a needle in a haystack, and he must know it, too. No, I’m not that stupid.”

Ives snorted. “Then what was your brilliant idea?”

“The exchange was done anyway, so I should’ve just driven away,” I went on despite his question. “I didn’t. On the contrary, I went to the hotel. I checked in, put my luggage away, gave the guy at the reception a generous tip and asked him to tell me if there were any decent bars in town. The first name he gave was _Voiletear_ , which couldn’t be a coincidence – ‘violet ear’ happens to be –”

“– a kind of hummingbird.”

“Someone’s done his homework,” I nodded approvingly. “I walked in that bar, asked for a beer, and stayed beside the counter to see if anyone’d came and talk to me. I didn’t have an actual plan, just a feeling. Some people tried to have a conversation, but none of them were who I was looking for. I finished my first round, put down my tip, and was about to leave when a drunk man bumped into me. He straightened up and muttered an apology, and I could tell he was nowhere near that drunk. It didn’t matter, I was there to have fun anyway. At least I didn’t come here for nothing. He brought me another round, and we started to talk –”

“Oh, come on,” The FBI across the table said, rolling his eyes.

“I told him I was a photographer from New York, and I came to Blue Rock Resort to watch hummingbirds. He laughed. I asked him what was so funny. He said, ‘two days ago I slept with another guy, who’d also came here for hummingbirds – at least he told me so, and he was standing just at where you were now. What’re the odds, huh?’ I immediately grabbed him by the collar, pushed inwards on his windpipe. I had such a reaction that it made him jump. The guy you hooked up with, what did he look like? I demanded. I don’t know, he wheezed. You can imagine my response: I stared at the guy right in the eyes, lowered my voice and warned him not to lie to me. He began to splutter, and finally told the truth. ‘We were here talking, and this guy led me to his room. He covered my eyes when I fucked him. I thought it was some kink, so I let it go, plus I was too drunk at the time –’ he smirked as if he’d seen through my secrets, ‘– I never thought you liked that sort of thing. Is it turning you on? Hey, after we finish this round, do you want me to show you around my room?’”

“Fuck,” Ives said.

And I smiled to tell Ives his reaction was perfectly understandable.

“I suddenly had an idea – call it a whim,” I went on with the story of that night. “I let go of the guy, and smiled at him encouragingly to show that I was just messing around. ‘This guy who came for hummingbirds as I do,’ I said, ‘did he give you his number? Do you still have it with you?’ Oh, of course, he replied, as if what I questioned was his masculine charm. That son of a bitch. I could almost imagine how he was pestering the other one two nights ago.”

Ives waited for two seconds before losing his patience. “Then?” he said.

“They took away my stuff when sending me in,” I shook the handcuffs to make them quietly clash, as a complement to my words. “I could’ve shown you my wallet if they didn’t. The note was still in its pocket; the number on it expired a long while ago, I just keep it out of habit. The note was for the dickhead, but the number was for me. On top of it was the words, call me.”

“I don’t think I need to ask what happened next,” Ives looked at me strangely, “You called.”

“Not right away,” lost in the memory, I shook my head as if to correct myself. “I waited until late at night to call the number, after doing what I had to do.”

_**The second exchange** _

_He waited. After two long, abrupt rings, the call was picked up. An unfamiliar voice answered._

_“So?”_

_“Not bad,” he said. “I mean the ‘call me’, and the thing with covering his eyes. The guy was impressed.”_

_“So you liked him?” the other side replied immediately. “I thought he’d be your type.”_

_“Liked?” he gasped in feigned surprise, loud enough to let the other hear it. “Are you saying I should like him, not just sleep with him? Yikes. I may have done something more than liking him – I killed him.”_

_“No, you didn’t.”_

_“Okay, I was lying,” he said flippantly. “I fucked him, the way he fucked you.”_

_The breathing sound at the other end seemed to falter for a split second; he wondered what the expression on that face would be. “You know where I am now?” after a while, the voice spoke, softly but coolly, “Oleg Karsakov. I’m in his bedroom, by his bed. The moon is lovely tonight; I put on a record for myself. It’s not opera, not that dramatic – just some jazz.”_

_He held his breath. Somehow, he read two contradictory traits from the steady voice: fragile yet dangerous._

_“Not saying anything, are you?” the other one asked teasingly, “his corpse is lying in front of me, and I’m wearing the corset holster you gave me – isn’t this why you gave me this present? Old Oleg liked men to dress up for him, so right now I’m wearing nothing but the corset. I’ve found the gun that suits it, Mr killer, I hope you’re satisfied. Tell me, have you considered changing targets with me?”_

_“We changed guns, but we’re not friends,” he said hoarsely. “Keep this in mind: when we're done with this, I'll kill you.”_

_“Wouldn't you do that anyway,” the other laughed, “if this never happened?”_

_“Before I found out who you are,” he replied, “I’m not in the mood to go as far as that.”_

_The stranger in the phone gave a chuckle from the back of his throat. “Did you have the thing I prepared for you?”_

_“Yes,” he said. “I’m looking at it.”_

_“Find the gun that suits it, Stanley,” the person said. “And consider my proposal – I was not talking about exchanging clients, that’s too reckless, you won’t like it – but if we just change the targets… our clients don’t need to know.”_

_“I’ll let you know,” he said absently. “Anything else?”_

_“Why is it not a gun this time?”_

_“Finding the right gun is harder than finding the right target, you’ve heard that one for sure.” His voice became so low that he had to stop and loosen his collar to make it sound normal again. “How did you fill the corset I gave you?”_

_“You’ll know,” the answer made him raise his eyebrows. “Good night. Oh, one more thing – you’ve passed the interview.”_

_The call disconnected. He closed the burner phone and tossed it aside. He lowered his eyes and looked at his other hand. Hands resting on his knees, his left hand, curled in a fist this whole time, now unclenched to reveal the object he’d been holding, which was –_

“A bullet,” I told Ives.

“Just shut up.”

“No, it’s true,” I told him, “that was what he gave me for the second exchange: a bullet. You’re thinking, most people can tell the gun model based on the bullet, and there’s really no puzzle in it, right? First of all, it’s not as easy as you think; you have to know a lot about bullets and firearms. Second, the bullet – it was handmade.”

“He made a bullet himself.”

“Looked like it.”

“And it was your turn to assign him a gun, wasn’t it?” Ives observed me. “What kind of gun did you choose?”

“I didn’t choose anything,” his question made me smile. “I came up with the idea while visiting a gun store. He received a corset that could double as a gun holster. I’d caught a glimpse of him from behind, so I had a rough idea of his size. I chose this toy for the second exchange, not as a humiliation, but – Oleg Karsakov, you’ve probably heard of him.”

“That was it?” Ives looked at me accusingly. “An oil oligarch with a taste for boys in drag? That was the puzzle you gave him?”

“If he tried to look at me from up close,” I shrugged, “then so would I – it was only fair. I saw the news when I checked out. He used a Colt, .45, like he was shooting a bear or a buck. But he didn’t shoot him. Karsakov was strangulated, killed without losing a single drop of blood. Of course, there was a hummingbird mark on the guy’s face. If anyone asked me, I’d guess he did it with the corset lacing, or his thighs – he had to be stripped down enough to get close enough, so we were even. You want the real story? What I told you was the real story.”

“Damn it, Stanley,” Ives crossed his arms and regarded me with a scowl. “Did you really fuck the guy in the bar?”

I closed my eyes. Some vivid images came to my mind: how I held that body beneath me, relying on its breaths, responses and shivers to envisage another man: as I ran my fingers over the heaving ribs, it was as if I were measuring the curve of another tightly corseted body. How I lay in the bathtub that night, masturbating in the heavy steam, thinking about Karsakov’s death. I leaned in, beckoning to Ives with a finger. He leaned closer a bit unwillingly, and I whispered into his ear.

“… Yes.” I said.


	4. Chapter 4

“And you never broke the rules once?” Ives asked.

“What do you mean?”

“For ten years, didn’t you for at least once say to yourself, fuck it, I'm gonna find out who this man is?”

“It’s unnecessary.”

“Yeah?” Ives smiled. “You sure about that?”

I stared at Ives’s face. Was I seeing things, or did he get more annoying when he smiled?

“If you have anything to say, say it,” I said. “I don’t like riddles.”

“Don’t get mad,” Ives shrugged. “I was just saying, you don’t look like someone who follows rules.”

“So,” I said sarcastically, “I should look into whose names those guns were registered in, is that what you’re saying?”

“Or find a place and hide there when you change guns,” he suggested. “Then you can see who he is.”

“And after that?”

“After what?”

“Suppose I know who he is, what should I do after that?” I gestured with my hand. “Kill him? Call the police? Or write an anonymous letter telling him there’s one more person in the world who’s guessed his real identity by chance?”

“Alright,” Ives said, petulant. “I get what you mean.”

“Good.” I said. “I have enough enemies, and I really don’t need more.”

“So you don’t want to know who he is.”

“I do, desperately,” I said. “But not in the way you suggested. I don’t like cheating.”

“You’re an honest and rule-following guy – just became a killer by accident.”

“Yes,” I smiled at him. “That’s exactly what I mean.”

“That’s not what the other one said.”

“What other one?”

“You know,” Ives said, his expression unchanged, “The other killer in the city? The one who changed guns with you?”

“You’re bluffing.”

Ives let out a heavy sigh, as if he was disappointed that I didn’t trust him. He reached to the machine between us and pressed a button. A voice echoed through the room, so clear it was unreal.

“I guess the first mistake I made was to suppose he would follow the rules. (And he didn’t?) – He did, but only for the first two exchanges, but the third time…” The voice paused. “Things were a bit complicated.”

Ives hit the stop button. “More specifically,” he looked at me deliberately, “what kind of _complicated_?”

“The other killer in the city, the one who changed guns with me, did he not tell you?”

“He did. But I prefer to hear your version of it.”

“Okay,” I said. “You got half the truth. I didn’t trace the gun; I traced the people. After the two exchanges, it caught my attention what kind of targets he chose. The words he said in Karsakov’s room – I don’t know, it gave me a feeling – that maybe he didn’t just happen to pick someone like Karsakov as his target. So I looked into it. I went to the public library, searched by keyword, looking through every murder report that mentioned hummingbirds and a mark on the corpse, the unsolved ones in particular. I reached out to a couple of investigators I knew. I even went to my informants (some of them are old acquaintances of yours, believe it or not). Didn’t take me long to find out all the jobs he’d done. The cases were scattered over the world, and unconnected on the surface, but I slowly came to see what they had in common: the people he went after were of the same type.”

“How?”

“Karsakov had been accused twice, but never proven guilty,” I said. “Of course, he’d got money and the best lawyers, while on the other side were just young and defenseless boys. I can give you more names; they’re all fascinating. There were rapists, domestic abusers and child molesters – my instinct was correct: there was a pattern.”

“You think this is a kind of…” It seemed as if Ives couldn’t bear to say the word. “… Personal fixation?”

“I didn’t know,” I replied carefully. “But now that I knew what type of people he liked to deal with, I could make an educated guess on what kind of jobs he’d take. It could help find out who he was, don’t you think?”

“Never knew you had a soft spot. Were you worrying about him?”

“Ives,” I said. “You keep interrupting me, and I’ll never get to the end of the story.”

His mouth twitched. “Go on.”

“The third time, I received a box of syringes.” I couldn’t help but slow down, to see if Ives caught the drift. “Two in a box. Now, that was interesting.”

“Oh,” Ives said. “The other guy finally started to think you needed a rabies shot? I totally understand that.”

I rolled my eyes at him. “They were insulin injections, Ives,” I corrected. “or at least that was what the box said. Both were clear, colourless liquids, no different from the usual prescribed drugs – provided you were not a doctor, I mean. To a professional’s eye they’d sure look different, but they were all the same to me. Who was going to research something used for subcut injection, other than people with diabetes? The interesting part was he wanted me to kill someone with them.”

“Nothing strange about that,” the FBI who’d seen everything chimed in. “Sometimes your fellows do use injections. They’re small, portable, and won’t make a mess. Most importantly, it’s easy to make it look like an accident.”

“I had an intuition, which was proven right afterwards.” I ignored Ives’s words. “– Between the two injections, only one was real insulin, and the other – if a diabetic injected it, they would be very sorry. It was more likely to hasten their death than delay it. I took this stuff home and studied it. It was ingenious; all I had to do was to switch out the medication. I didn’t even need to do it myself.”

“But?”

I looked up blankly. “What?”

“My instinct tells me there’s a _but_ somewhere.” Ives said sternly. “You couldn’t help yourself, in the end.”

“I was just curious – why did he choose that drug?” My mind was wandering a bit as I replied. “You see, some injections can trigger a heart attack. If he just wanted to play a game with me or challenge me, he should’ve picked something like that. But what he picked belonged to a category with very limited application; I’d looked up the drug, and it was for people with hereditary diabetes. And that means – he had a specific target in mind.”

“Don’t tell me,” Ives narrowed his eyes. “Let me guess – you figured out the target.”

“Just a general direction,” I pursed my lips. “A sex offender with type I diabetes, notorious but never convicted? Even taking the whole New York as the sample, there wouldn’t be too many people who could fit the description. Does it make you happy? That the fight against crime is finally getting somewhere? Of all the names I could think of, only one fit every description. He was one of the richest in New York, highly respected; messing with him was practically suicide. So I stuffed the box of toys into a drawer and said to myself, that I wasn’t breaking the deal if no one ever wanted to get rid of the guy.”

“But the job came.”

“After less than a week,” I blew out a sigh. “Christmas was near, when the job did come.”

“I think I know who you’re saying,” Ives thought about it. “Old Randolph? But ever since he started to need the wheelchair, he hadn’t been out of the house for years. His house was impregnable, with dedicated guards; there was no way you could get in.”

“No comment.” I said. “Anyway, I took the job. I won’t bother you with the details, ’cause not a single part of it was legal. After receiving the injection, the target would have thirty seconds before finally dying, and it was then when I showed up. Not because I was arrogant enough to think it would be cool, but because the client had a strange request – that within those thirty seconds, I should read a list of names to the target.”

“A list of names?” Ives asked curiously.

“Yes,” I said without hesitation. “Darrell Cain, James Miles, Paul Walberg – I still remember some of the names. You’re dying, I told the guy, and someone wanted me to read the list to you before you die. He stared at me and couldn’t breathe, like he was looking at a ghost. He tried to ring for someone, but I had knocked out his personal guard and his masseur. Then the strangest thing in my entire career happened.”

I paused to drink some water, as Ives took down the names. Our eyes didn’t meet until I put the cup down.

“He reached out and grabbed me,” I recalled the scene, still unsettled by it. “For a guy in a wheelchair, he was exceptionally strong. ‘He told you,’ he said, out of his breath, sweat all over that face, ‘Only he – only he knew the dosage and the time.’ In our business, people say all kinds of things before they die, but nothing’s been more bizarre than what was said that night. ‘It’s you,’ for a second he stared at me, gritting his teeth, as if he recognized me, ‘why… do you come back? It’s you… it’s you who took him.’ He went on with some nonsense like that, the same words over and over again. And then he sneered. ‘He told you,’ he was holding on my sleeve with all his might. ‘Neil sent you, that little bastard –’ and that was the last words. His face started to twist, and soon he was dead.”

“Neil.” Ives repeated. “No surname?”

“Don’t set your expectations too high. I looked into it, and there was no such person called Neil Randolph,” I said coldly. “And no sons of gardeners or chauffeurs with that name, either. Up to that night, the name was my only clue and the closest I ever got to the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird. When he sputtered out that name, I completely forgot to breathe.”

“This ghost called Neil, you think it was connected with the Hummingbird’s past?”

“Perhaps,” I said. “But there was nothing concrete. Nothing to work on. After the event, my curiosity reached a peak. I wanted to know who the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird was, wanted to know why he couldn’t kill the man in the wheelchair himself. I was entranced. On the fourth exchange, I did something stupid. I decided to hide somewhere rather than just leave as promised like the times before. I hid myself, so when the guy came to fetch the gun, I could see for myself who he really was.”

Ives smiled without humour. “And he said he’d never done that.”

“I lied, which is a common thing to do in my business.”

Ives straightened up eagerly, and made a gesture as a way of saying let bygones be bygones. “You hid yourself, and then?”

“After the phone call we were more cautious than before. The exchange never happened in open space again. Normally, the meeting spot would be in a hotel. He would book a room under a false name, and leave the stuff in the room; then I would enter with my universal key card, find the travel bag, take the thing he left to me in the bag, and put my gift in it – throughout the process, we didn’t need to really meet. But that time, instead of leaving after taking the stuff, I hid into the closet. The person who booked the suite would return around four, when I’d finally know who he was. He’d take his gift and check out, and I’d leave after he left. The whole plan was infallible.”

“But your expression tells me,” Ives pointed out, “that things didn’t go as smoothly as planned.”

“I hid in the closet.” I raised a hand to stop him from interrupting. “Just as expected, at four – four twenty-six to be exact – someone opened the door with the key card. He entered, hung up his jacket, poured himself a glass of wine, and took his time drinking it. I hadn’t seen his face yet, as I couldn’t risk standing too close to the closet door, but it didn’t matter – when he walked over to the travel bag, I would see him anyway. I heard him drink, ice cubes clinking in the glass. The next thing I knew, a gun was aimed at me from outside the closet.”

“And you didn’t see him?”

“I thought about it afterwards, too. I think he immediately got down on his hands and knees, and crawled across the carpet, so I didn’t hear a thing when he approached the closet. There was a decisional error in my plan – I could only look through those gratings on the closet, which meant I had a very limited view: I could see a person walking directly towards me, but definitely not a person lying at my feet. But I did hear the man pull the latch. In the silence of the room that was very clear; the gun was aimed at my kneecap.”

“A bullet in the knee can hurt like hell.”

“Sure,” I agreed. “And that was why I turned obediently when the guy aiming at my knee told me to turn around. I turned, facing the darkness in the closet, while he stood and opened the closet door. His gun finally left my knee, only to be pressed precisely onto the back of my head. Shhh, he said gently.”

“That sounds really bad, Stanley,” Ives laughed.

“The guy was standing right behind me; I could feel his breath on the side of my neck. ‘This is how you follow the rules?’ he asked. ‘You don’t trust me, either,’ I replied. ‘Trust goes both ways,’ he said after pondering a bit. ‘If you can’t keep our promises, we should stop the game.’ He said it in a determined tone. ‘What do you mean?’ A wave of anger swept through me, ‘you want to get rid of me?’ He chuckled. ‘This is it.’ He whispered, ‘I could’ve killed you, did you think of that? Forget about the exchange. Now let me go.’ I stepped half a step backwards and pushed myself against the gun. His breath hitched immediately.”

Ives scratched his stubbled chin and flexed his shoulders.

“I was playing with fire,” I admitted with a nod. “My adrenaline was surging, but my mind was clearer. ‘I already know how you get into the business,’ I said to him. ‘But I couldn’t guess why. You gave me the injections, because you were trying to tell me about your first time, right? Nelson Wiley died from injecting the wrong type of medication, too; how old were you then? I’ve met the guy in the wheelchair, Neil.’”

“What did he say?”

“His whole body tensed for a moment. Before, he had been relaxed, even when he was pointing at me with a gun. My words seemed to hurt him. ‘Yeah?’ his tone was still light, almost like he was amused, ‘How did you get into the business? What was your first time like?’ The next moment, the gun moved away, but I didn’t have time to feel relieved. Something like a syringe thrust into my neck, and I blacked out.”

“This fourth exchange was really full of surprises,” Ives said.

“When I woke up the other man was sitting on my thighs, a Mark 23 moving against my skin, and his warm breath against my pulse. This is the gun you’ll be using next time, he said. Doesn’t have a LAM or a suppressor yet, but I believe you can do it yourself – treat it nicely, it’s a new gun. And I’ve got your thing; give me a hand. – I didn’t realize what he was referring to, as the voice was so soft and casual, until my hand was led to rest on his back.”

I fell silent meaningfully.

“It was a silencer,” I spoke again. “Disposable, for 9mm’s. He asked me to put it inside his body – hot, but also insane. He had a job later, just in that hotel, and had to get around the search. Apparently, this item I gave him was the only thing that would give away his identity, or at least so he said.”

“In the process,” Ives said, “you never saw his face?”

“Temporary loss of vision, induced by some kind of drug,” I answered with certainty. “You should be glad I’m still alive.”

“Yeah,” was Ives’s perfunctory reply. “Finish the story.”

“I will,” I replied. “But only after you tell me how Michael Sutherland died.”


	5. Chapter 5

“You want me to believe,” Ives said unhurriedly, “that you don’t know how Michael Sutherland died?”

“I really don’t.”

“Nice try.”

“Mind you, three days ago, I woke up in my own house, and it was surrounded by a bunch of cops,” I said. “And the leading guy kicked the door open and stabbed a gun in my face. Of course I could ask him how the Great Sutherland died, but he had that expression on his face as though I killed his son’s hamster, so I assumed he was not quite in the mood for a chat. And then your people handcuffed me, sent me into the van and kept me here. Apart from you, I never get to see a single friendly person who’s at least alive.”

“Perhaps that guy was mad because you were damn hard to find,” Ives reminded. “You installed a load of motion detectors and that infrared alarm at the door. Who has that kind of thing in their own house? If he knew you kept a landmine in your backyard and a sniper’s nest in the study upstairs, he could be even madder; also – you were the reason he didn’t get his first cup of coffee in the morning.”

“That makes sense.” I thought about it. “That explains it. It sucks when you can’t have coffee in the morning.”

Ives rolled his eyes. “Even if you don’t know how Sutherland had died,” he said, “why should I tell you?”

“I didn’t kill him,” I suggested helpfully. “But I might know who did.”

“That’s it? Are there other reasons?”

“I know Michael – sorry, Sir Crosby – wanted you to find out the murderer as soon as possible, because the media won’t leave you alone these couple of days. If you tell me how on earth Sutherland died, maybe I’ll be able to provide some insights.”

“That’s better,” Ives said. “It won’t hurt to tell you. The insurance company thinks that the first thing to catch fire was the incense burner beside the bed, which lit the newspapers by the table, and then the fire was spreading fast. The wood floor was on fire, and then the fireplace – those nights were really cold, if you still remember, and the fireplace was blazing. Soon the whole room was burning; any normal person would run out of the house and shout for help at this point, but old Sutherland had so many sleeping pills that night that he didn’t feel a thing. It was too late when the firefighters arrived. Michael Sutherland was burnt alive.”

“Accidents are always the most heartbreaking,” I nodded solemnly.

“Accident?” Ives said. “This was murder. Whoever went after Sutherland had made painstaking preparations for a very long time. About a year and a half ago, somebody convinced Sutherland to renovate the old house. It became fancier, sure, but one of the rooms was filled with flammable substances enough to burn down a circus. I asked Sutherland’s housekeeper, and the master didn’t use to sleep in that room until he moved into it six months ago. You can shrug them off as coincidences, but so many of them happening at the same time – what’s the odd? The final coincidence was, the incense happened to be in the room, and beside it happened to be a heap of newspapers, and also – there was enough wood in the fireplace to burn an elephant to death.”

“You mean it was arson? Then what are you waiting for? Just arrest whoever did it.”

“There’s no evidence,” Ives frowned. “And, other than me, no one supports the idea.”

“It does sound unrealistic.” I added before Ives could get upset, “breaking into a New York billionaire’s house at midnight just to set a fire?”

Ives didn’t answer immediately. He flicked the ash off his cigarette and gave me a thoughtful look. “You forget I was once in USMC,” he said. “I recognized the angle at which the incense was positioned. It was sneaky – he didn’t need to light it himself. He just needed to know how to fire a sniper rifle. A rifle can light the incense from two hundred yards away, and the rest of it would be a breeze. Who we’re looking for is an experienced expert, a former soldier and an excellent sniper. The first person who came to my mind was you.”

“Impressive.” I said. “That’s why you invited me here?”

“Sounds simple, doesn’t it?” Ives said. “But that night, there was another person in the house. Before the fire, someone sneaked into Michael Sutherland’s place. This person managed to open the safe in the study, but when they left, they triggered the alarm. Sutherland’s guards arrived in time, but the intruder got away. Judging from the shell casings at the scene, the person escaped with an injury – not a minor one, either. The simplest theory is that the person knew Sutherland would die that night and the police would be soon all over the place, so they hurried to get the stuff they wanted before the bridges behind them got literally burned. The problem is, how did they know before us that Sutherland would die that night? And what did they take away with them? If they had the ability to open the safe, how could they be so dumb that they set off the alarm at the door? It doesn’t make any sense, don’t you think?”

“What do you think?”

“My theory is there were two people in this. One of them killed Sutherland, and the other was just there to leave a trail to get the other off the hook.” He glanced at me. “And probably plotted this entire series of coincidences that led to Sutherland’s death, too – but I can’t prove it. My genius boss thinks all of this is complete nonsense; he thinks the murderer was just one guy. His idea is, Sutherland saw the guy’s face, so the guy came back at midnight to light his house on fire. He thinks the case is straightforward, we just need to find a moron with an injured shoulder – oh, and he thinks this moron is you.”

“Your boss is clever,” I approved. “It’s a pity I’m not injured in the shoulder.”

“So he has another idea,” a faint smile formed at the corner of Ives’s lips. “He reasons, that Sutherland’s guard didn’t hit you at all – after all, it was a dark night, and it’s not impossible that they made a mistake – anyway, I’m just here to make you confess. As to how exactly I’m making you, his suggestion is that I whack you on the head with the phone book.”

“The other one, then?” I said. “The guy in the other room. He’s probably the one your boss is looking for.”

“I’ve told you –”

“Whatever I say, you won’t tell me anything about the other person, sure,” I nodded sympathetically. “So if you’re not getting anywhere, why not just give up? You close the investigation, the insurance company pays the bills, and I get back my freedom again: everyone’s happy.”

“Because Sutherland’s son isn’t going to let it pass; he insists that his father was murdered. And he lets out the news. Now the media are after us,” Ives glowered. “Perhaps I’m wrong, perhaps these two people didn’t know each other’s existence, but that’s even more ridiculous: For a long time not a single person wanted to kill Sutherland, and suddenly there were two, and they chose to do it at the very same night? I’ve told you all I know. Tell me, what do you think?”

“The first person – I mean the one who messed with the safe – could be some insignificant thief, nothing to do with Sutherland’s death.”

“Ha, I think it had everything to do with it. It was due to the shock it gave him that old Sutherland needed some pills when lying down.”

I clamped my mouth shut and stopped being helpful.

“These two accidents were so closely interconnected it was like an ouroboros,” Ives went on. “Which is astounding, really. Even if we caught the first person, the only thing we can do is to charge them with burglary, ’cause we still don’t know what they took. To commit the murder it would take not one killer but two, and the pair would have to work immaculately together. Ring any bells?”

After a long pause, I finally said: “… they really owe you a better office.”

“I like this place,” Ives retorted. “I’ve finished my part of the story. Now it’s your turn.”

I must admit that my story was a bit less remarkable than Ives’s. “Well. At that moment, if someone opened the door and walked in on us, they’d probably think we were in some sort of sex game. But actually – are you familiar with ne-waza?”

“Judo?”

“Correct,” I said. “I’m not very enthusiastic about judo. The instructors made us practice some ukemi [1] in training, but nothing beyond that. The person used osaekomi, the hold-down techniques; what he really did was to restrain my movement, using muscles of his waist and thighs to keep me from moving. The precision and coordination in his exertion of force were mesmerising. He weighed less than me, but he pinned me firmly into the mattress. He was dangerous, innocent as he might look – and he had a gun in his hand.”

“You were impressed,” Ives said, “’Cause he was the only one who could disarm you?”

“One of the reasons,” I said. “And he knows his way of submission. [2]”

**_The fourth exchange_ **

_He awoke with a swelling soreness in the back of his head. His vision was red in the edges. Someone was sitting astride him, holding him down with their body weight. He tried to move, only to be more helplessly pinned down. The palms that covered his throat, the lower legs that twisted his ankles, stopped him from moving forward. He relaxed his shoulders as much as possible, and lay down on the sheets silently, flat on his back. The other one sat up lazily, as if he’d accepted his acquiescence. But every time this person moved, it was to put more pressure on him._

_He could barely move his lower body; the other man’s gloved thumbs pressed into his skin. Every time the muscles of his throat tensed, the leather on the other man’s palms would brush against the arteries on his neck. The person had just taken a shower: the body still smelled faintly of moisture. He wiggled, trying to find a position to fight back, and the person deflected his attack without effort, the agile body kneeling on the bed, thighs braced around his waist. He tried to strike back with his hands, but one of them was handcuffed to the bed. The man was moving on top of him, crotch pressed tight against him, but he couldn’t feel the man’s weight. Being held down again, he fell back onto the sheets breathing heavily, pursed his lips and raised an eyebrow at the darkness right above him. This guy’s heartbeat was slow even in a fight, and his breathing didn’t give away any signs of panic, which was admirable. He held up his free hand to surrender. The handcuffs finally stopped their wild rattle._

_“If this is just for riding me half-naked,” he said. “I’m totally down for it, no need to give me a shot.”_

_“I figured.” The voice said, and a loaded Mark 23 was pressed against his thigh. “What about this?”_

_“This,” he laughed wryly. “Is something else. You drugged me just in order to point a gun at my head?”_

_“This is the gun you’ll be using next time. Doesn’t have a LAM or a suppressor yet, but I believe you can do it yourself – treat it nicely, it’s a new gun. Now you’re awake, give me a hand.”_

_The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird put something in his hand, grabbed his wrist to lead his hand to the Hummingbird’s own back. Where his fingers touched, he felt the restrain in his opponent’s movement, self-control and boundaries coming into place in the other’s body, and expressed through his fingertips. It was the result of long-lasting training. For a second, he allowed his hand to stay there, marvelling at the response. So, this was part of the puzzle – the other’s knees when he was kneeling upright; the smooth curves of his torso; the shivers underneath the skin; the muscles, firm and strong. He thrusted his hips upwards; the other man arched, and squeezed his shoulders as a warning. He raised his head, the tip of his tongue against his upper lip, questioning in silence. In his own hand was the item he himself chose for the exchange – a suppressor, small, compact, designed to endure hundreds of shots – this was what he used for his first murder._

_“I have a job later, right upstairs in this hotel.” The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird’s voice was soft and controlled, with a hint of coldness. “Your gift is the only thing that’ll possibly give away my identity. Help me to hide it, unless you have better ideas to keep my cover.”_

_He wanted to ask more questions, but realized with some dismay that he didn’t want to know more. He turned his wrist and stuffed the thing inside with vehemence; the person threw back his head and bolted upright, but, surprisingly, didn’t cry out. The knees that were braced on his sides clung to him more tightly, the warm body lowering to press itself against his chest. He paused, changed the angle, and quitted being tentative, thrusting the toy in deep. Now he could feel the muscles pushing, and he only needed to manoeuvre his wrist to get himself into the deepest end. Instead he stopped abruptly, pushing a thumb into the stretched opening. He was rewarded with a low hum, hips that thrusted toward him, and a gun that pressed on his crotch. He let himself pause, captivated by the heat clamped tightly around his fingers. It was dangerous to test the limits of someone who was the same kind as himself, but he didn’t want to stop. He slid in more fingers, one at a time, pausing occasionally to check on his own heartbeat, on the limits of the other body._

_As he slowly, almost viciously put in his fingers, stretching and rubbing the other’s inside, the gun in the Red-Throated Hummingbird’s hand pressed against his pants. The threat, equally big and equally close, almost made him dizzy. His belt was unbuckled, and then a hand undid his zipper. While he had three fingers inside the other’s body, the semi-auto rubbed up along his throbbing dick. The muzzle traced up from his perineum, pressing against his balls, before tracing the outline of the head that was already dripping. He gritted his teeth panting, swathed tighter and tighter in a sort of sensation he’d never experienced before, while being confined brought about greater uncertainty. The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird had four fingers in himself and had been desperately filled, but didn’t turn into a sobbing mess. This stranger wrapped a hand tightly around his penis and the semi-auto and stroked, making him almost shout out from overwhelming stimulation. The other’s palm was slick with sweat, but its movement was unhurried, and pleasure drew near him like a razorblade. He came as the Hummingbird pulled the slide to reset the trigger from rest, feeling the distinct, half-exposed structure of the cocked gun. It then left his dick, moving up against his chest, thrusting in between his lips. He tasted his own cum. He curled his fingers, deliberately pressing against the other’s prostate when he moved his knuckles. Drops of sweat landed on his body, followed by a shout; the other man’s cum splattered across his chest._

_The person braced a hand on his chest, short stubbles scraping over the back of his ear. He nipped on the other’s ass when he’d pulled his fingers out, and was answered with a brief chuckle. He heard a clicking sound, and in his hand he felt the gun, already pushed back into the slide. Above him, there was some rustling going on with the clothes, sounding tie-related. He lay there, limbs relaxed, resting the free hand on the small of the other’s back. The guy leaned down and kissed him; he closed his eyes in response. However, the moment the kiss ended, he suddenly pulled out the backup gun from under the pillow, lifting his arm to aim at where the other’s heart was beating._

_“You aren’t going to kill me.”_

_He snorted, throwing the gun aside. “Next time you try to handcuff me somewhere, search the room first.”_

_“Why a silencer?”_

_“It’s about my first time. ’S all I can tell you.”_

_“If this is your apology, I accept it.” The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird smiled. “I’ll look into it. See you, Stanley.”_

_Footsteps receded. The door would soon be closed before him, and something must be done about it. He cleared his throat, licked his dry lips wet, and said –_

My thoughts must have wandered; it took a long time for me to register Ives’s voice.

“Finish your story. What did you do, to keep that guy in the game?”

I looked up at him.

“I said: ‘I’ll take care of the guy upstairs for you, if you deal with Darren Brown and his dance for me – we’ll exchange targets.’”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] (original footnote:) a technique in judo which allows you to minimize the damage you suffer from a fall.
> 
> [2] (original footnote:) this is a pun: “submission” is also a technique in MMA.


	6. Chapter 6

“What you were exchanging were real people,” Ives said. “And it didn’t bother you?”

“Electric bills past due are what bothers me,” I said.

Ives didn’t laugh. “Tell me the details of the exchange.”

“I don’t want to.”

“What?”

“I don’t want to go into detail about this exchange,” I said. “If it’s possible.”

Ives was thrown for a loop. I’d been so cooperative ever since the interrogation started, I think he didn’t even remember I was not on his side. Still, I reminded him, and now he didn’t look very cheerful – it was the first time I rejected him in his face. I nodded to confirm my words, not feeling a bit guilty.

“Why?”

“This question,” I said. “I refuse to answer, too.”

“Does it mean,” he paused. “That you killed the wrong target? Or did the other side mess up your mission? Which one?”

“Your imagination is running wild,” I said. “Neither of the above.”

“Then there’s no harm in saying it.”

I looked at his face, and simply uttered one word: “– no.”

I tried to be brief, but Ives still sniffed out something from it. It was so annoying – the change in his expression, the narrowed corners of his eyes, and the fingers rhythmically tapping on his lap, all indicative that he discovered something.

“Oh,” suddenly, Ives got it. “I mean, wow.”

“Stop.” Ives talking like this always gave me a headache.

“Poor Stanley.”

“Just stop.”

“The guy made you kill a person who you wouldn’t have touched given the normal circumstances, who you’d violate your own principles by even considering to kill, am I right?” Ives’s tone shifted into something between feigned sympathy and wholehearted mockery. “He fooled your ego, so you don’t wanna talk about it. Now, will you drop the cowboy shit – even for half a second – and listen to me closely? I’m looking for the people who killed Sutherland, you hear me? I don’t care if you murdered Teletubbies or whatever god-awful crime you committed. Fuck, if you make me happy, I can consider forgetting the things I’ve heard in these days – _if_ you make me happy, Stanley. So answer the fucking question.”

I stared at him. “That was impressive,” I said, heartfelt.

“Thanks,” the other replied. “I’ll put it another way: do you shut your mouth all of a sudden because you’re in the same room as an FBI, or because you’re in the same room as a human being who’s at least kinda friendly to you?”

“The former.” I said.

“It’s a federal crime, then.”

“I never said that.”

“Uh huh.” Ives was amused. “Listen. We can’t be in a standoff like this forever: you may have no place to go to, but I wanna leave this dumpster fire and go home. How about we both take a step back? You don’t need to tell me what happened in the mission where you changed targets; only what happened before and after.”

I thought about it. “That’s all you need?”

“I promise.”

“Deal.”

“Talk about the preparations.” Ives reminded me.

“After the exchange was settled, the rest was standard procedure. We exchanged memos, about how to imitate each other’s M.O., how to contact each other after the missions, and of course,” I said, “how to deliver and collect the cash.”

“You mean ill-gotten gains,” the FBI agent said. “I think that’s the correct legal term.”

“Matter of perspective,” I said, good spirit intact, “what I’m getting at is, all of this worked out smoothly.”

“Oh.”

“The words, ‘Cayman Islands’, usually solve a lot of problems.”

“Imaginable.”

“I’d leave a mark on the target’s body the way he did, and he’d try his best not to pick any locks out of habit.”

“Seems you guys got along well.”

“The problem was,” I went on, “after I’d handed the job over to him, how he could prove he killed the person the way I would do it. Photos and audio records would leave too many trails. Security cameras and eyewitnesses were simply out of the question. I could wait on the spot for the ambulance or the police to come, but if possible, I’d rather avoid doing that kind of thing.”

“What did you settle on?” Ives asked.

“Stamps.”

“Stamps?” Ives was so caught off guard he forgot to give any sarcastic remarks.

“In my study there’s a stamp album. Under every one of the stamps there’s a blood fingerprint. It’s the only place that no one would ever check, the place that is the easiest to ignore. The stamps are common, nothing valuable, and if the police break into my house, it won’t be something they’ll have as their primary interest.”

“That’s really incredible,” the other said.

“Incredible for USPS, indeed.” I agreed, “chances are they never thought, either, that people still cared about stamps nowadays. At first, I’d compare the fingerprint I received with the fingerprint of the target, but I forgot it over time – near-death experiences would distort them in indescribable ways. I wouldn’t check the blood types, of course, it was not CSI. We left the fingerprints out of good faith; there was no forensic significance in it.”

“You know what, this story is some sort of guilty pleasure,” Ives said with a frown. “Even though it was anything but normal, you keep wanting to know what happened next. How wrong am I in saying this?”

“Don’t ask me, I can’t tell right from wrong anymore.” I relaxed a little. Everything became easier after the secret was out. “That was the preparation. I’ve told you everything.”

“At this point,” Ives commented, “the consequences of losing the game were already unthinkable. Did it ever come to your mind?”

“Come to my mind?” I said, amused. “I never stopped thinking about it. But –”

The button sprang up, interrupting my words. I glanced at the side of the table: side A of the tape had just ended. Ives took it out, flipped it over, and put it back in. I didn’t resume what I was saying; he didn’t press on, either.

I was deep in thought, listening to the nib of the pen rustling across the paper. Eventually, it was Ives who broke the silence.

“Talk about what happened after.”

“You know,” I started from the very first thing that I thought of. “Christian Talker was a really stupid name. I’ve seen a variety of false names since I got in the business, and that one stood out. It was my fault. I should have realized.”

My rambling confounded Ives. “Should have realized what?”

“The atmosphere,” I nodded at him. “The job. That night. Everything was suspicious.”

“You didn’t kill the target.”

“Oh, I killed him. Killing him was as easy as cracking open a walnut, nothing challenging. Incidentally, it was the easiest job I’ve ever done. The target was so easy to take care of you couldn’t begin to understand why someone would bother trying. I could imagine someone disliking the guy, but hiring a professional killer to get rid of him? That’s making too big a deal out of it. He looked like the kind of guy who wouldn’t hit back if you hit him. When he realized what I was doing in his room, he didn’t even try to fight back. He almost made me feel sorry for killing him. No, I’m not talking about the target, I’m talking about what happened afterwards – the next morning.”

“What happened the next morning?”

“I read the papers,” I answered. “And there were photos of him. He was younger, and with less beard, but I recognized him immediately – it was who I shot in the head last evening; but on the papers he wasn’t called that ridiculous name. I saw the photos first, then read the headline of the article: it was concise and to the point, every American citizen with conscience would gasp at the sight of it.”

“You were in trouble.”

“And big trouble, too,” I admitted with some dismay. “It took me ten minutes to read the article, and everything clicked. It was like a jigsaw puzzle, and the report fitted in a missing piece somewhere in my mind. All of a sudden, everything I let slide last night that didn’t make sense started making sense, and in that moment, the whole picture became clear.”

“Who you killed was not who you thought it was.”

“You couldn’t imagine. I put down the newspaper to have my breakfast – swallowed my eggs and downed my coffee, as if nothing had happened. After finishing this satisfactory breakfast, I walked to the telephone, picked it up and called a number. I didn’t waste time rehearsing it in mind, because I had only one sentence to say.”

“What did you say?”

“‘What kind of person exactly did you just make me kill, and why were the last words he said to me _thank you_?’”

“Fuck,” Ives said. “For real?”

I nodded, taking some time to gather my breath.

“There was a long silence before he answered: you better leave the place, Stanley. I didn’t respond; I was too mad to think properly. ‘I ask you one more time – what kind of person did you make me kill?’ I said again. Five seconds later, he told me, enunciating every word: ‘who you killed was a federal witness who was going to testify in court in six months. So, if I were you, I’d leave as soon as possible.’ For a moment I couldn’t say a word, could only hear my own furious breathing. The collected voice said in my ears: ‘time to go, Stanley.’”

“I can see why you were mad,” Ives said. “You killed someone you didn’t want to kill.”

“It’s a way to put it,” I laughed self-deprecatingly. “I don’t kill witnesses. I don’t go after the powerless and the undefended. There’s one thing I’d never do, and that is helping those who’re able to afford the money get rid of those who can testify against them. Laugh if you want to, I know it sounds ridiculous – believe it or not, people like me have standards.”

“I’m not laughing at you. Everyone has their principles to live by. You have them, I have them, Mr Ruby-Throated Hummingbird probably has them. But if the person you touched was in WITSEC, why did he thank you?”

“I didn’t want to know at that moment,” I said, gritting my teeth. “The only thing I cared about was how to get out of there. As for the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, I never wanted to see this person again, or have anything to do with him for that matter. For me, the game was over.”

“But not for the Hummingbird.”

“– I really should stop.” I said meaningfully.

Ives gave me a pitying look. “Still think you’ve got all the cards, Stanley?” He said. “Sorry, but I’m the boss here. Perhaps I’ve been too friendly for you to keep that in mind. I’ll make myself clearer: Whatever I want to know, you have to tell me, because only I can tell you if the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird is alive or dead.”

“But you guys have got him,” I said, despite myself. “You just told me yourself. He’s in another room.”

“He was, for the record, in another room, but the room was not here, but in a hospital.” Ives frowned, as if recalling some unpleasant experience. “The hospital staff called the police: suspicious case of gunshot wound. Police officers who went to the scene got him under control and had his preliminary statement, but he escaped before they could transfer him. Now he’s probably changed his identity. The more you tell us, the sooner you can help us find him. You know it better than anyone that he must receive medical treatment, though he probably doesn’t think so himself – the guy was hurt pretty bad.”

I put on my best façade of disinterest, but the suddenly hitched breath probably gave away my thoughts.

“No? Not planning on saying anything? What was the truth about the night when Sutherland died?”

I took in a careful breath. “Is he…” After a long pause, I said. “… alive?”

“I’m here to tell you this.” Ives’s smile faded. “Two hours ago, someone spotted a man in a gas station. The description fits who we’re looking for. He was in Greenville; paid for the gas under an alias. In three hours he’ll arrive in Charleston, which is where we are now – provided he’s still alive. I guess his destination is you. Whether he’s going to kill you or save you, I have no idea.”

“Your math is terrible, Ives,” I pointed out sharply. “It shouldn’t take as long as five hours to get here from Greenville.”

“Yes, but that’s when the driver isn’t wounded and wanted,” Ives replied. “In fact, judging from his injury, we’re all shocked that he can still function. I’ve said all I can say. It’s your turn now.”

I said nothing. Ives shook his head, reaching a hand to the recorder. I seized the opportunity to grasp his hands when he was not looking. The handcuff link was pulled to its tautest, shaking as if it was going to break. I clenched on as forcefully as I can, and Ives muttered a curse, unable to move for a moment. The patrol on duty tried to step in, but Ives shook his head at him mutely.

“Don’t let them find him,” I whispered. “You hear me?”

He looked at me, surprised. He’d probably never seen me lose it like this. “Ives.” I pleaded.

“I hear you,” Ives replied, also in a whisper. “Let go of me. You want all the people outside to rush in?”

I cast a glance at the patrol behind him. The guy put a steady hand on his sidearm, but his face was turning pale. I let go when the young man pushed down the buckle on his holster. Ives fell back in his chair with a thump. He kept silent, which was commendable; it was instead the guy behind him who let out a deep sigh. The sound of relief reminded me. I gave Ives a look, who laughed suddenly as though he couldn’t help it, and sighed in resignation.

“Officer,” Ives said without turning around. “Please leave.”

“But he just –” The other person in the room protested, startled.

“Get out.”

I didn’t relax until the guy in uniform walked out and closed the door, before I felt a stabbing pain in my wrist. Ives saw the fresh bruise on my wrist and cursed.

“Spit it out.” He said in barely controlled anger. “You must have something to tell me if you need that guy to leave. I’m waiting.”

“This is not for me. It’s for you.”

“Bullshit.”

I calmly adjusted my sleeve cuffs and sat back, as if the panic before was just a disguise.

“What’s the rush, Mr Agent? What are you keeping from me? You’ve met him, I think, and he took the opportunity to steal your gun. So –” I stopped, observing his expression. “– you’re as desperate to find him as I am.”

Ives’s entire body stilled. He shook his head. “You know nothing, idiot,” he said with bitterness. “It’s not for me, not for the goddamn gun either. Forget your pathetic ego. The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird is actually –”

Although his reaction was not unexpected, it was way too intense. His words didn’t make sense, either. I waited for him to go on, but he stopped halfway. He went silent and didn’t meet my eyes, sulkily reaching into his pocket. He slapped the cigarette case on the table, and lit the cigarette in front of me. I calmly agreed to the truce.

Ives grabbed my cup, flicking the ash into it. I avoided his eyes and pressed the handcuffs on the table.

The silence stretched on before I broke it. “Why did he run away?”

“I was hoping you could tell me,” Ives shrugged. “He took my gun, injured two people in the hospital and disappeared. If you know where or to whom he is likely to go, you better spit it out now.”

I sighed. “Okay,” I said. “Back to exchanging the targets; I haven’t got to the last part yet. I just said that the game was over for me, but for him it was the opposite. About half a month later, I went back home and a person was sitting on my sofa in my apartment. This person had broken into my apartment, and was holding a gun in his hand, but he acted as if he was in his own house. This audacious asshole broke all the lights in my place and fixed himself a drink, and just sat there waiting for me to be home – I don’t suppose I need to clarify who that was.”

Ives waited for me to keep going.

“‘The game is over,’ I told the guy. ‘I didn’t even know your name.’”

“What did he say?”

“He smiled. ‘Didn’t Randolph tell you?’ he said. ‘Or have you forgotten?’ Then he offered his hand.” I extended a hand, as if to re-enact a pantomime. “‘Neil,’ he said. ‘Now you know me.’”


	7. Chapter 7

“He was injured,” I stated. “And he aimed at me with a Remington 870.”

“A what?”

“A short barrel shotgun,” I told Ives. “They used to produce 14.5-inch barrels, but there are only 12.5-inch ones now. The gun was called Witness Protection, which was definitely not a random choice. Picking it, and bringing it into my apartment, the whole thing itself had a kind of naughty playfulness in it. So, not only does our Mr Hummingbird kill people for a living and specialize in lockpicking, he also has a twisted sense of humour.”

“I have to say,” Ives said. “This doesn’t sound like you. The Stanley I know wouldn’t stand some stranger breaking into his house. If you open the door and find a stranger sitting on your sofa drinking your booze, you’re more likely to break all of their teeth than let them speak.”

“The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird is different. He’s a fellow in my business. I had to know if someone else was after him.”

“Quit it,” Ives looked at me as if he had looked through me – an irritating stare. “Why not just admit he’s special to you? What you have for him can even count as trust, can’t it? Even for someone like you? Have you ever considered, that the guy has become part of your life and your secrets, and that’s the reason why you couldn’t kill him?”

I stopped, offended. I made sure my eyes – cold, fixed and threatening – conveyed the offense. Ives immediately yelped; he threw his hands up high in the air, pretending to surrender.

“Forget I asked. What happened next?”

I didn’t answer him right away. For a moment, memories flooded me.

_**The fifth exchange** _

_I stood in the dark, studying the other person. A beam of light in the hallway cast a long, long shadow in front of me. It was as if the light leaking in from behind was just molecules of dust, as if it couldn’t illuminate anything, but it outlined the other’s distinct silhouette. I narrowed my eyes to examine him, and moved one step forward, no more. I reached behind my back and caught the door that was swinging itself, gently closing it with a sure, firm push. Now, the last trail of light had vanished, leaving two people exchanging bland stares across the silent air. I put down my hand which had been watchfully holding on the handle. The motion stirred up the dust in mid-air: the tiniest particles floated in silence._

_A warm breath of wind blew across the room, lifting up the curtains, and I cut off my dawdling gaze on his face. The next second, before I realized I was moving, I had walked across the living room and entered the kitchen. I stepped on the files scattering on the floor, but didn’t look down at them. I had come in with my coat shed and my sleeves rolled up; the holster on my shoulder was exposed, the brown leather tightly pressing into my shirt. The other man was still sitting where he was, one leg resting on the other. I pretended not to notice he had changed his posture. Ice cubes were melting; from the square cup in the visitor’s hand, drips of water splashed on the floor. I retraced my steps to where I was, taking a more casual position against the wall. The person raised his hand to take a sip of his drink, an ankle swaying idly. My hand discreetly reached into where I had hidden my gun, but it touched nothing. I gave myself a slight pull, so that my back left the wall; the other person immediately lifted his foot half an inch off the floor, and I saw my gun under it. With a smile, I leaned back. The man in front of me relaxed and slumped into his seat, when I heard a barely stifled groan, along with some rustle of the clothing. I glanced at the dim figure before me, from the barrel of the shotgun to the crumpled skinny tie in front of his chest. It suddenly hit me that he was injured._

_“Leave this place,” was the first sentence he said to me, more of an order than a greeting._

_“Pardon?”_

_“It’s time to exchange hiding places,” the reply I received was mocking and composed. “The taxi’s already downstairs. I told him to wait till you show up. I’ll text you the address – a friendly reminder: it’s better to travel light.”_

_Feelings of perplexity, anger and being fooled crossed my mind one following another, but they disappeared eventually. A sneer escaped me; I nodded curtly at him, turned around and walked into the bedroom without needing to hear it twice. When I walked out, there was a travel bag in my hand, with everything I needed in it. Actually, they had been packed up and tucked beneath my bed since a long time ago. This was not my home, just a safe house, I wouldn’t lose anything no matter what; but it didn’t mean I could forgive this impulsive move of him – he broke into my place, pointed my own gun at me, and barked orders at me. He made me break the rules and kill a witness. Wherever this guy went, he fucked my life up. Perhaps it was time to put an end to everything. Pressing my hand against the door, I glanced back at the person who had darkened my doorsteps. The figure in the dark didn’t show any surprise or gratitude, which I had expected. He leaned forward, a leisurely index finger brushing around the rim of the glass. The reflection came from nowhere: a pale flicker of light suddenly flashed in the hummingbird-shaped pinky ring. His hand caught a droplet of water falling from the rim, and he sucked it in, lower lips around his fingers. I couldn’t help but cleared my throat, instinctively averting my eyes. I heard the springs squeak when the figure on the sofa leaned back, a very distinct sound. At that moment, I heard the guttural sound of him swallowing._

_“Alright,” I spoke with dismay, feeling tricked. “I hope we won’t meet again, ‘Neil’.”_

_“Does this mean goodbye?” Putting down the glass, he laughed softly in the dark._

_“It means goodbye forever,” I told him. “The revolver under your foot – it’s yours now. Do with it whatever you want. If your wounds wouldn’t heal, or if you couldn’t make it to the hospital, you could still play Russian roulette with it.”_

_“Are you mad because of the last exchange, or that I broke into your house and it’s not to beg you to fuck me?”_

_He didn’t articulate the word_ fuck _, only mouthed it under his breath. The syllable popped and burst out in the air, producing a fascinating effect. I frowned. Behind the frivolity there seemed to be something else. He’d rather put on a camouflage of flirtation and light-heartedness than turn to me for help._

_“Of course,” I answered. If we were competing in a game of treating one’s own life as a joke, then why not? “Someone broke into my living room holding a shotgun and he didn’t even beg me to fuck him? It’s killing me. Goodbye, Neil.”_

_He was still there the moment I closed the door. His expression didn’t change at my curtain call._

_“You can jog,” he said. “If you like jogging. I didn’t mark the route of my morning run, but it’s not difficult for you to find out. There’s an ice-cream stand at the corner. I recommend their chocolate flavour. Also, there’s someone with an ugly tie always sitting downstairs with a newspaper – that’s the NYPD agent who’s after me at the moment. It’s a nice neighbourhood, really. Provided you don’t hate the Russians, because I may have pissed off some of them.”_

_Those were his lines to bid me farewell. I shrugged it off with a laugh and slammed the door shut. The moment I closed the door, the lights in the apartment behind me were turned on. I stilled, then shook my head at myself. I got played by the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird again._

“That son of a bitch didn’t break all the lights in the house at all,” I said. “He just wanted me to think he did. I couldn’t believe he played me again. In the whole conversation, I might’ve had a chance to see him properly. Now see what I’ve got? I’ve met him twice, had some key information about him in my hands, but I can’t possibly do it if he’s in a room full of suspects of similar height and weight, and you need me to identify him.”

“Maybe you didn’t want to know what he looked like, have you thought about that?” The other man said. “Risk avoidance. What you just described is exactly what you’d need to avoid – I mean, if one day you had to identify each other.”

“Agent,” I said amiably. “What kind of person do you think I am? I’m not petty-minded.”

“But not simple-minded, either, or you’d be dead by now,” he cut through my cover ruthlessly. “You got in the cab, got the address of the guy’s hiding place, then urged yourself to forget the key information about his appearance – that’s more like your way of doing things. So, how was his place? Did you like his sweet little home?”

“As for that,” I was more than glad to change the subject. “It turned out he lived just on the other side of the city. A typical New York brownstone. There was even a fire escape. Everything was just like what Mr Hummingbird had described: A map on the wall, an ice-cream stand at the corner, a guy with an ugly tie spending half his day downstairs. I compared the map and the regular patrol route of the block, and it didn’t take long – a process of elimination – to find out the route of his morning run. The ugly-tie guy had sandwiches for lunch on Tuesdays and Thursdays, tortillas on Saturdays. Over time, I could tell what day it was based on what he had for lunch.”

“And the Russians?”

“I beat some of them up, and told the rest to relay the message.” I shrugged. “They never caused any more problems.”

“And that was all of it? You always wanted to find out everything about the guy. And now you were invited to enter his living place and settle down, and that was all you noticed?”

“You got me,” I smiled innocently. “The truth is, the first thing I did after entering the door wasn’t initiating a running route or going to the windows to look for some agent on a stake-out downstairs; I didn’t care about ice-cream stands or how many flavours they offered, either. I picked his lock, tossed the travel bag on the floor and took a deep breath: the apartment was his hideout, and I had plenty of time to explore its secrets. A rare opportunity. Besides, he left in a hurry, so most things in the apartment were left as they were.”

“You didn’t behave, did you?” Ives said pointedly. “You got naughty yourself.”

“Not calling me a dirty bastard now?”

“We’ve passed that phase,” he said. “Tell me.”

“All his personal possessions were self-contradictory, filled with puzzles and chaos just like himself. His closet seemed to belong to several completely different people: cheap linen jackets – the cloth had worn so thin you couldn’t tell the original colour – were put side by side with expensive custom-made suits, and Hawaiian shirts were next to the formally tailored ones, as if he was making fun of himself. He had a bathtub, but also a very tatty shower where water couldn’t run smoothly, and I suppose he used the latter more often. He had a bed, but in a corner of his room he had a futon with pillows, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he slept on the floor. There was a hammock in the living room, too, as if he put it there just to trip the guests over. I also found a hookah, some gummy bears, cookies with weed in them, some tobacco from India, an astronomical telescope – and a medal from Alcoholics Anonymous.”

“No pictures?”

“No pictures,” I said. “But I found his guns. Like me, he had a place for hiding things. In his study, there was a wall that can be turned over; If you pushed it open, behind it was a space as big as a closet, where he kept all his personal collections, along with some toys I’d given him – the corset holster was in there, too. And I found a box, which was filled with pieces of paper like a heap of snowflakes. I read one of them, then went on to read all the rest like I was possessed. They were all clippings – reports of the murders where I was involved. He had collected them like a child collecting stamps. I was dumbfounded; I put the box where it was and never opened it again. Now, it was clear as day: this guy had been researching me. He didn’t miss a single job I did.”

“Seems like when you were fascinated by who the other was,” Ives said, “he was too. How long did you stay there?”

“Until the things quieted down,” I said. “That is, until no one would care who killed the witness or where the killer was hiding. One night, I texted him saying, _I’m going to fuck someone with your gun and leave it on your bed. When you come back, fuck yourself with it because you owe me_. The next day, his number was deactivated and I knew he had received the message. The gun had the scent of sex on it; I left it on the bed. When he pushed the door open, he’d spot it right away. It’d smell like a woman's cunt, which was also a comeback to him. I put a bundle of cash tied in rubber bands next to the gun, like paying a prostitute. ‘Thanks for your treat’ – I left a note. I know, I acted like a scumbag. But it was the only way I could think of to say goodbye.”

Ives let out a low sigh. He stood and patted me on the shoulder, wanting to say something but didn’t. Walking to the door, he opened it before immediately closing it again, as if to check no one was eavesdropping. He came back to his seat and straightened his tie, offering me an absent-minded smile. “Listen,” he said, his tone suddenly urgent. “It still isn’t too late. They’re not charging him with first-degree murder; burglary and trespassing tops. If you tell me where he is, I won’t tell anyone – there's still time to find him before it gets out of control.”

“Ives,” I said sharply. “The fact that you have no one to trust suffices to explain why I can’t tell you anything. We both know if the wrong person gets the message, he’ll only die sooner. So quit trying.”

He smiled ruefully. Eventually, he pursed his lips, resigned. “Alright,” he lay his hands flat on the table. “You’re right about one thing: in the team, there are fewer and fewer people I can rely on. Now, if you don’t want to tell me that, let’s get down to the actual business. When did you see each other again after that time you parted?”

“Two years later,” I took a sip of water from the cup and said, taking my time, “on California Zephyr, the Amtrak train. I was with my ‘wife’ and he was with his ‘partner’. We caught sight of each other at the bar, even though he didn’t have the words Ruby-Throated Hummingbird written over his face. Two minutes later, he sat down in the booth next to me with half a glass of vodka, and offered a hand. ‘My partner wants to know if you’re interested in swapping dance partners,’ He said. ‘He’s right over there. He thinks your companion is attractive.’ I looked at him and smiled. ‘She’s my wife.’ The guy laughed, as if I just said something ridiculous. ‘No,’ he said, ‘she isn’t.’ The whole thing was getting more and more interesting. I raised my glass and shook it, as a greeting to the man behind him, who looked flattered; he was having a conversation with my companion. ‘Does your partner know, then,’ I said, in a voice that only the two of us could hear, ‘that he’s going to be murdered tonight?’”

“He smiled, neither admitting nor denying it. I held his hand, and his gaze wandered on my face for a moment. We didn’t talk again, but we both knew why the other was on the train.”

Ives chuckled.

“What happened afterwards was a bit of a blur. He introduced that guy, and I introduced my wife, et cetera. We got familiar with each other pretty soon, and I bought another round for the group – but that was later. This guy downed the vodka and put down the glass. Before leaving the booth, he whispered in my direction – _thanks for your treat_ , he said. Everything was so real; I felt heat through my body. His tone – low and teasing – if it did carry the indications that I thought it did. I went back to my roomette, but couldn’t keep the guy out of my mind.”

“So?”

“So,” I said. “We fucked together five hours later, and I solved the mystery myself.”

“And the answer is?”

“This man on the California Zephyr to Chicago,” I said, “this man who kept a gun with a silencer in his bag, this man who, like me, turned the tourist train into a mobile shooting range – was the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey, translator here. Just a heads up that the next few months are a bit busy for me, so while I'll continue to ~~spectacularly butcher up the good writing in the original~~ translate the fic, the following chapters won't be coming up as often as before; I won't be able to reply to comments as promptly, either. Sorry for that.


	8. Chapter 8

“‘You two will get along, right?’ The man asked me. He’d introduced himself as Kyle’s husband. ‘He’s just a bit shy in front of strangers. Give him some time and he’ll be fine,’ he told me.

“After dinner, he sent Kyle to the door of my roomette. One second before he’d acted like he was thrilled to get rid of his regular partner, and now he was holding the other in his arms and kissing him over and over again, all sad-eyed as if he was so heartbroken to be parted from him. I took my time, watching the show with my arms folding across my chest. So, Kyle was the name he used in this mission. He probably had a fake Irish passport, too, didn’t he – I found the thought very funny. It made me suppress a laugh, and Kyle raised his eyes to cast me a lazy glance – with nothing remotely close to shyness in it at all.

“The man turned around and blew a kiss to this hostage he brought here to trade. Before he closed the door, what the guy saw was a bewildered ‘Kyle’ sitting with his hands beneath his legs, a sheepish blush on his face; he ducked his head and didn’t look at me, but kept looking at the guy who sent him here. I heard his breath that was heavy with embarrassment, his hair a sweat-drenched mess on the back of his head. His fingers dug into the bunk, and his shoulders were leaning forward in an awkward position. But as soon as the ‘husband’ shut the door, Kyle turned into another person. His gaze was no longer timid but alert; his hands-beneath-legs posture changed as well. The moment our eyes met, we moved almost simultaneously. I grabbed at him and he jumped, slid out from under my armpit, dodged my fist and sprinted for the door. He was so close to opening it but I held him down against the door before he could. I raised my elbow to catch him by his throat and drag him backwards. He hit my lower abdomen with his fist, and took out my gun as I bent over. The next second, neither of us moved, just listening to our heavy panting. His back was pressed against my chest, the clothing of his sweat-soaked shirt heaving up and down with my own breaths. I leaned over and wrapped him in my arms, as if he wasn’t aiming at me with a gun. My stubble rubbed against the flushed skin on the side of his neck, and he turned to look at me, blinking with uncertainty. I pressed myself closer to his back, and he exposed his throat as if he couldn’t help it, as he slid a leg between mine. We stayed there like that for a while, both waiting for the other to give in. I reached out to undo his belt, but he put a hand on my groin. I cursed, and held him tighter in revenge. I heard him laugh; I couldn’t help but rasp out a laugh as well.

“‘This is how you get shy in front of strangers, huh?’ I said.

“‘Just you,’ he turned his head and glanced at my face, ‘this is specifically for you.’

“Goddamn it. I decided to stop talking. I pushed him up against the door and searched him, from the shoulders to the thighs, and it did seem he didn’t bring any weapon into my room – but you couldn’t be careful enough if your opponent was someone like him. Every time as I finished searching one place, he detached one of the parts from my gun swiftly and expertly, like a joking retort. After I had finished with his whole body, he turned around in my arms and looked at me, licking his lips as if to challenge me. He uncurled his right hand, and the magazine, the slide and the barrel fell to the floor one after another, an accompanying drumbeat to the rattle of the train.

“‘Don’t tell me you think that’s my only gun.’ I raised an eyebrow at him.

“‘Yeah?’ he said with a non-committal smile, ‘what other kind of gun do you have? Show me.’

“The tip of his tongue brushed over his lower lip. His eyes told me it was indeed a double entendre. I stared into his eyes. I unbuckled his belt fervently and reached my hand in, and he threw his head back gasping for air as if there was suddenly not enough air in the room. I didn’t say anything after that, just utilising my fingers – and soon he was clinging to my shoulders and his legs came around my waist, his lips parted, eyes wet now with some genuine timidness in it. I clenched my fist, caging him in by the small of his back to stop him from escaping. He let out an uncontrollable shout, and then it was all rapid gasps and a soft whimper. I held him, took my hand out tracing along his belly, and showed him the cum he’d shot in my hand.

“‘Jesus,’ he said roughly, and smiled at me. ‘I was hard the moment I walked into your room, you should’ve seen –’ and my expression put him to a halt.

‘Tell me you’re really the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird,’ I said. He stuck his tongue out to lick my palm, but I moved it away. “Tell me you’re the one I’ve been looking for.”

“His eyes turned from teasing to uncomfortable, and then to downright upset. ‘I –’ He forced a smile and lowered his eyes to look at himself, ‘damn it, isn’t it clear enough by now?’

“‘I need to hear you admit it yourself, that you’re the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird. You want me to fuck you? I will if you tell me – or we’ll never need to meet each other again.’

“‘I – I can’t,’ he ruffled his own hair, chagrined, ‘it’s for your sake, Stanley, it’s better that we don’t know –’

“‘I don’t care,’ I didn’t let him finish. ‘Say it.’

“He forlornly avoided my eyes. ‘You don’t happen to be wearing a wire, do you?’ he joked. ‘These two years haven’t turned you into a police informant, have they?’

“‘You know I don’t,’ I pressed on. ‘Say it, Neil.’

“He pursed his lips and sighed in resignation. ‘Don’t make me do this,’ he said pleadingly, ‘why on Earth –’

“‘You have to give me something,’ I said, ‘You’ve seen my face, lived in my place, you’ve even used my gun but I know nothing about you. You have to give me something before I move on with the game – don’t you see? I can’t stop caring anymore, and I’ve been caring too much. For you, for the missions and for the goddamn fucking game. So stop stonewalling me, Neil. Tell me.’

“The word _care_ made him startle. He shot me a hesitant look, and I nodded at him decisively. ‘You know what I wanted to do?’ I said self-deprecatingly, ‘when you walked in this room?’ I leaned close to his ear. ‘– I wanted to fuck your brains out so you’d never be able to walk off this train.’ His eyes widened slightly at the image I depicted and he pursed his lips in resistance. ‘Then why don’t you?’ he said, half-joking.

“‘I will,’ I said. ‘But first, you have to tell me who you are.’ My hand fell to his hip, my thumb and index finger pressing violently into it. He inhaled, furrowing his eyebrows, eyelashes fluttering with hesitation. His eyes were already watery with want. I spanked him, urging, and he smiled ruefully, tongue brushing across his lower lip. ‘Alright, Stanley, I’m actually the –’

“And there was suddenly a piece of wire rope in his hands. It went dexterously around my neck in a knot and cut into my throat warningly when I moved. ‘Don’t move,’ the man in front of me adjured gently. ‘You don’t think someone like me would break into a fellow’s room with nothing in hand, do you? Now, be a good boy if you don’t want to break your neck.’

“I nodded. his hand moved away; when I grabbed the doorknob, choking, he was already gone. I opened the door, searched for him car by car and found nothing. I went to the dining car; I even jimmied the restroom door to see if he was hiding inside – one hour later, I came back to my roomette exhausted and empty-handed. That obnoxious bastard must have jumped off the train, or any other ways to get rid of me that I could think of. I pulled the door of my room open, and he was inside. But there was another stranger, who was holding a gun and aiming it at my old friend’s head.”

The patrol on duty came back. His sudden appearance interrupted me. The person pushed the door open, pulled his hat low, and walked up behind Ives. Ives absent-mindedly accepted the coffee the person handed him, and gestured for me to keep going.

“‘I apologize, sir,’ the stranger said, ‘but your hook-up tonight is a wanted murderer in the Carolinas – could you please ring for the conductor? I know you have nothing to do with the matter – I’ll tell them how big of a help you are to me when the police show up.’ And he flashed his ID at me and told me he was a state marshal, and so on.” I stopped to drink some water. “I showed the man my most innocuous smile and told him I was glad to help. I pulled out my backup gun when I turned around to reach for the door, and fired before his expression could change. He collapsed. I pulled the door closed, and removed the silencer. My outlaw friend kneeled down beside the marshal in shock and checked his pulse. ‘You killed a marshal?’ He looked up at me with astonishment and accusation, ‘he’s innocent!’

“‘Blanks,’ I said flippantly. ‘he can’t check your identity now. He has to bring you off the train – we only have one chance to take him out, which is here and now. I lied when I said I had a loaded backup gun.’

“‘You lied about having a real gun?’ he laughed, stunned, ‘and you bring blanks with you just to deal with me?’

“I shrugged and looked with amusement as he threw away the guy’s ID and appropriated his gun. He even loosened the guy’s tie. ‘So you do care about the lives of the innocent – then why you made me kill a witness that time?’ It wasn’t a good time to discuss that, he told me. We each held the unconscious cowboy idiot up by one arm and helped him into the back car. Even if someone saw us, they’d only think he was drunk. We kicked the door of the back car open and threw him off. He rolled over into the thicket by the road, got up with a groan, and looked at the train in confusion as it went away, just standing there for a long time before he started to stumble after it. It was so hilarious that we both laughed; we heard each other’s laugh, and couldn’t help but stop and look at each other. As my gaze slowly turned into something else, he cleared his throat. ‘We – we’d better go back to the room,’ he said. ‘You’re wanted in the Carolinas?’ I said, ‘I’m impressed. Is there anything else I don’t know about?’ ‘Actually, I’m not wanted in the Carolinas,’ he said humorously, ‘I guess he mistook me for you.’ We looked at each other and laughed again. Laughter turned into low chuckles, and he stopped to look at me. I stopped inquiringly, and he licked his lips, looking back pointedly. Next thing I knew, he grabbed my tie and led me to our room – our steps were so eager that a guy sitting in a corner marking papers rolled his eyes at me and shook his head, saying ‘for God’s sake’ in a deliberately loud voice. The door was locked. I tugged hard at the lock but it wouldn’t budge. The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird laughed softly. He said, ‘need a hand?’ And I raised my eyebrow but stepped aside. The lock slid open smoothly at his fingertips as if it was never locked. He dragged me in and I slammed the door shut, scooped him up and threw him onto the bed. 

“No time to care about clothes; he unbuckled my belt and turned over, and I pulled his pants down to the knees and went in. ‘Tell me how you’re going to take out your target,’ I said by his ear. ‘When the train stops at the way station, I’ll do it,’ he said brokenly, ‘– I have twenty minutes. Derek will find an excuse to get off, supposedly for a smoke, but in fact…’ In fact what? I grabbed him by his hair and pulled back, so he was forced to lift his head. ‘In fact it’s for some heroin he’s been hiding in his pocket…’ A thrust forward made him moan, his fingers digging into the sheets, ‘… I’ll bypass the cameras and make it look like an OD. He’s called his lover, so the police won’t be looking for him until twenty-four hours later. I’m…’ I slammed him into the sheets and his waist started to tremble, he lowered his head and bit his arms trying to muffle the shout, ‘…I’m getting off in Chicago, and buying a plane ticket to New York.’ ‘That’s right,’ I nipped his ear as I told him, ‘that was the foreplay I was talking about –’ I’m a dirty bastard, you said? Oh he was the same, I tell you he was the same, that single sentence made him ridiculously hard, he lay there and just gave up struggling, opening his hole to me completely. I slowed down, as if we had the whole night ahead of us…”

“Stanley.” Ives spoke, as if to persuade me to get the story back on track.

I pulled myself back together and smiled at him. Didn’t explain why my story was suddenly filled with explicit details. Didn’t explain why I’d slowed down my speech. I had noticed that the patrol on duty tonight was not the same person as before, which was probably inevitable – not everyone was able to stand bloody handcuffs and stories with murder as foreplay.

“Where was I?”

“The second time you went back into the roomette,” Ives said. “Did he admit he was the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird?”

“Turn off the machine. Don’t bring in your gun, and enter this room like a man,” I said. “Then I’ll tell you.”

“What was that – are you daring me?” Ives looked at me, perplexed. “You know how many years in jail they’ll charge for first-degree murder in NYC, right?”

I stared back, unimpressed. He flashed me a forced smile and pushed his coffee to me, softening his tone.

“Not that I don’t believe you. The problem is,” Ives said, “you didn’t leave anyone alive to tell the story. Witnesses? even more unlikely. The only person who can confirm the story is not in the room at the moment. No one can testify to it.”

“I can.”

An unexpected voice rang out. Our eyes darted to the same place. The man who had just entered this room looked up, and it was at this moment that we saw his face. He was holding a gun, smiling at us. He raised an index finger and said to us, _shh_.


	9. Chapter 9

“After that,” I said. “Everything went back to normal.”

“But only for a very short time,” a voice added.

“We returned to the game.” I said.

“But it was never the same game as before,” the voice said again.

I took in a breath and told myself not to mind the guy who kept cutting in. Although he was sitting right across from me and Ives with a gun in his hand. “Now that the sex was included in the picture –” I tried to speak for the third, and the last, time.

“Everything became complicated.”

I closed my mouth and turned to the man who interrupted me yet again. “Why don’t you tell the story?” I said, my smile unwavering on my face.

“I’m glad to,” the voice’s owner winked at me, “but I’m not the one who calls himself a Protagonist.”

“Says the man who gives himself the name of a bird,” I countered. “If there’s one unreasonable person between us, it’s you. Speaking of this, do you come to kill me or rescue me? You still haven’t told me.”

“Haven’t your instinct told you?”

“My instinct tells me you can’t even rescue yourself,” I shook my head at him. “So, either you’ve conceived such a hatred for Ives that you must smear your blood on one of the chairs in his office, or you miss the coffee in FBI so much you have to drive for five hours to have a cup – either way it has nothing to do with me.”

“I’m just here to return the gun.”

“Yeah?”

“Because I don’t need it anymore,” he said. “Because I don’t have the habit of keeping someone else’s gun with me.”

“I figured.”

“And,” he cast me a glance. “I have a vision – and my visions for the future are usually reliable – that within the next forty-eight hours, it’s very likely I’ll either be arrested for murder, or die from complications of the gunshot wound. Since there’s no happy ending for me, I think I’d better start with simple things – which is giving the gun back. Five days ago, I stole it from an FBI who went to visit me in the hospital. He’s the most stubborn bastard in the law enforcement system of New York, but he’s a friend nonetheless.”

“Now,” a smile curved his lips as Ives snorted. “Now that the easiest mission’s accomplished, let’s talk about other things. We have to spend the night here, so I hope we can get along. I don’t know about you two, but I could really use some sleep because I’m fucking tired – driving while injured was a nightmare, and I’ve run out of Advil. But I digress. After dawn, you get out of here,” he said to me, “Mahir and I got a boat for you. But you can’t use your codename anymore. As for you, Ives, in the morning, you tell your direct superior that the guy who killed Sutherland has come to give himself up – he’s injured and he’s the real Protagonist: your previous conclusion was all wrong.”

“Impossible,” Ives scolded.

“Is it?” The man said. I didn’t understand how he can be this gleeful; it was the first time I saw someone so at ease in an interrogation room, as if he was at a garden party he hosted himself. “Because I was thinking on my way here that only two people can testify against the Protagonist, who’re both in the room at the moment. If you, Ives, don’t tell the truth, none of this will be a problem.”

Neil looked at him patiently, the corner of his lips twitching. “Because if I took him away from here, you’d be responsible for it; if I took him away from here, chances are I wouldn’t make it to the hospital, and you’d be left feeling guilty for the rest of your life. The last thing I want to see is you taking the responsibility for my deeds, Ives – I’ve thought about it, and this is the best solution. Tell them I’m the one you’re looking for. I’ll get the treatment and you’ll still have your job: they should’ve promoted you a long time ago.”

“Excuse me,” I interrupted his reasoning, frowning, “I haven’t agreed to your plans yet. I can leave here without help. You can probably persuade Ives, but absolutely not me – perhaps _I’m_ the most stubborn bastard in the room.”

“I considered that, too.” He muttered.

“Seems the drive made you consider lots of things,” I said sarcastically, “so you must’ve considered how to talk me into this, too?”

He turned to the other person without haste, as if he had expected my questions. “Ives,” he said. “Tell him.”

The FBI, who had been slumping in the chair crossing his arms, now cast a look at me. “Are you sure?” He said.

“Tell him.”

“The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird is our informant,” Ives spoke without looking at me, “He was working with us all along. From the information he’d provided, and the materials that surfaced these years, we’ve gathered enough evidence to prosecute you. The Sutherland case was just an opportunity. The truth is – your time is up. You never failed not because you were lucky, but because we let you. You can’t get out of here, whether or not we can pin Sutherland’s death on you or not, Stanley.”

The other two people in the room seemed to wait in unison for my outrage. But I fell silent. My breath became gravelly and harsh; the existence of the cuffs scraped over my skin. I slowly blinked away the drops of sweat that fell into my eyes, feeling my hand closing into a fist.

“It is the truth,” the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird added. “You’ve started to suspect it, haven’t you? You’re thinking, why would Ives let me steal his gun? Why would he appear in the hospital? Why, from the moment I entered the room until now, didn’t he jump and take away my gun, although he looked perfectly capable of doing so? Well, your suspicion is correct – I sold you out. I’ve known Ives for a very long time. Do you need more than this to be persuaded? Now, at least you didn’t need to make that decision.”

“What decision?” I said.

“If I chose to run away with you, if I took you away from here, on which road you’re going to kill me,” the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird didn’t avoid my eyes, “that’s the decision.”

I stared into his eyes, gritting my teeth.

“I was badly injured, and if you had to bring me along, you have to make the choice between sending me to the hospital or running away yourself. Now that I couldn’t make it to the end, why not end it as early as possible? You’d do it in some quiet place – maybe even with hummingbirds around – so no one would know the truth of the Sutherland case. And no one would know the truth about you. Don’t feel guilty, you’re just getting rid of a safety hazard. You’d probably shed some tears, but you’d do it anyway – see? I know you very well. Now, at least I’ve made the decision for you. You won’t have to make it again. Because, you see? I bring a present with me.”

“What kind of present?”

“Your story,” he said, “because I can fill in the blanks for you. Because other than you, no one knows the game better than I do.”

His voice became very low; shades of fatigue skimmed across his face. He leaned into the chair carefully, and took a cautious breath. “Stop talking for now,” Ives’s voice cut in, “you better rest for a while. I need to make a call –” Neil straightened up, alarmed, and Ives flipped his hand to let the other see the number he’d dialled, “– just to Wheeler. Remember her? She’s a forensic. She can probably get us some morphine, and if we’re lucky, she would probably agree to take care of your wounds – I’m not certain how she’d think about this mess, gents. It can help you through the night, maybe get you some sleep. As for you – we’ve wasted a lot of time. I suggest you finish the story.”

I shrugged. “At this point, does it really matter?” I said.

“Of course it does,” Ives snapped. “No one knows the details of the game but you yourselves. You don’t think you owe yourself an answer? He didn’t steal my gun because he was worried about the police, right? There are other people who’re after you, and they don’t want you alive at all. It was out of the very same reason that you told me not to let others find him. I don’t believe in righteous murder, but if you can convince me that Sutherland deserved it, I can consider letting you go.”

“Then what about your promotion?” I laughed.

“Fuck promotion,” Ives said.

He threw something to me – the key to the cuffs. I took a look at the key, then at him. He shrugged.

“Your dignity won’t allow you to run away,” he looked at me wryly. “Perhaps I’m wrong. But I’m willing to make a bet.”

I looked over at the man sitting across from me. Neil sagged in the chair, his head drooping. The fingers clenched so tightly on the gun that the knuckles turned pale. The uniform was on his body but wasn’t dressed properly – it was apparent that he put it on in a hurry, with one unfastened button at the collar. I pushed the tiny metallic thing back, and shook my head at Ives.

“I need a drink,” I said, “more than the key. And I think you do, too. Do you have any alcoholic beverages?”

“Of course,” Ives said. “ _To serve and protect_ is our motto. Want anything else? Cigars in Crosby’s drawer? Wheeler’s handmade cookies? Weed in the locker room? Or the off-brand whisky my alcoholic partner hid in the drawer?”

“Whisky, thanks,” I glanced at Neil in his lethargy. “And – if you have any painkillers lying around.”

“I’ll be right back,” Ives grinned.

He opened the door and got out, leaving me with my killer partner. I watched the other’s face, listening to the steady breathing.

“He’ll come back in less than ten minutes,” Neil changed his posture, and slurred drowsily, “if you want to move.”

“I can’t move,” I had put on my best bedside manner, but I couldn’t resist the urge of saying something sarcastic. “I told him to leave to give you a chance to spit out the things you couldn’t say in front of him – this is your last chance, Neil.”

“I’m not an informant,” said the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, in the voice that I was so familiar with, but now with some extra blandness in it, “I’m an FBI agent, but only Crosby knows my identity. The game is real, Stanley, only I’m not on the side that you’ve imagined. They think I’ve lost control, because I killed people who weren’t supposed to be killed, and revealed secrets that weren’t supposed to be revealed.”

“But?” I said.

“But,” he continued, “if I give you to them with both hands, bygones would be bygones. I shouldn’t have come here to rescue you, but I’ve injured some people and stolen a gun. I think Crosby already knows everything and thinks I’ve changed my side.”

I crossed my arms, thinking. “One more thing,” I said.

“The deal still stands,” he lowered his voice, almost in a whisper. “I left you a bullet.”

I sighed. “I’m not asking that, Neil, I’m asking whether or not you –” Ives opened the door. I suddenly had an idea, and changed the question midways, “– dated this guy before.” Ives stopped, amused. I met his eyes with a poker face.

“I think what he’s trying to ask is if we used to sleep together,” Ives said in all seriousness, “who knows? If you stay long enough in this room – and I’m lucky enough to forget the fact that you’re a goddamn son of a bitch – I might tell you.”

I turned to look at Neil, but he closed his eyes pretending to be asleep, ignoring my plea for help. Ives pulled out his chair with a flourish and sat down. The mug he handed me had _Prime Suspect_ written on it, while in front of him and Neil were regular paper cups. I lowered my eyes to glance at the two scribbled words; Ives opened the whisky bottle with a pop as if to say, “what?” and I looked up at him with a conciliating smile, until he poured a substantial amount of whisky in my mug. I tried to hand Neil the mug, but Ives put his hand on mine to stop me. “If your plan is to get drunk,” Ives said, “then it’s good for just the two of us.”

I raised an eyebrow and shot a meaningful glance at Ives’s hand. “Now he’s thinking we definitely fucked,” Neil chimed in.

“Have your pills, genius,” Ives pushed the other cup towards Neil. “This is water – don’t make that noise, do you know how hard it is to find water in this place? I can find a dozen different kinds of booze but not a single cup of water that at least looks clean, so you’d better drink it up with some gratitude. As for you, charming cowboy, finish your story.”

“Sutherland’s son insisted it was murder,” Neil said. “Because he hired the murderer. Every piece of information about Michael Sutherland – the fact that he wanted a renovation of the old house, the model of his safe, the room he usually slept in, his bedtime, the number of his guards, the time when they shifted duty, the type of incense he liked to put at his bedside, the brand of his sleeping pills and how many of them he took per night – was provided by his son for the person, or people, who he hired. Now, Damien decides to use the police to get rid of the murderer, so no one’ll know the truth of his father’s death.”

How unexpected. My mouth twitched. “Sure,” I sneered. “it’s also okay to start from there – do try and keep up.”

Ives signed to make me pause, and refilled his glass. He raised his head, gulped the whisky down in one shot, put down the glass and made a face.

“Screw the standard procedure,” he took out the tape in the recorder and threw it aside. “I always wanted to do this – go on.”

“After the incident on the train,” I said, “we went back to the game – but it was not the same game anymore. No, I think the game itself didn’t change. _We_ changed. There was a time when I was just content with how things were, although I knew deep down that it wouldn’t last long. We met, with our respective targets, changed them, and parted. During that period, almost every mission ended in sex, and the jobs were done with passable end results – I mean, at least no one saw through our covers. Until one day, when I was assigned a target I didn’t want to exchange. Her name was Kat; who hired me was her husband. She had a six-year-old son, and I was supposed to take her out on the yacht, you know, and make it look like she jumped off? But I couldn’t do it in front of her son. I never met my mother – I don’t know why she abandoned me, but I know the feeling of being abandoned – and I didn’t want another kid to go through this.”

“I couldn’t hand her over, either,” I went on. “I know that once I put her in the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird’s hands, I couldn’t have a say in her life and death, ’cause that was how our agreement worked – but coincidentally, Mr Hummingbird had a person he was reluctant to exchange, too, and you must remember who it was. You were on the yacht, too; you were supposed to be Neil’s target.”

Ives’s hand stopped pouring the liquor. “Yeah,” I said. “that time – I ‘saved’ you, you started to suspect me. In retrospect, does everything make sense now? I didn’t want to hand over Kat, and Neil couldn’t hand over you – that was the beginning of our disagreement.”

“Son of a bitch,” Ives said dismissively. “But I didn’t meet him face-to-face. I remembered the yacht; I was sent there to keep an eye on Sator.”

“Well, someone wanted you to stop,” I shrugged. “Anyway, that was a bit of rewind for you. Ready for the rest?”

“Hold on a minute,” Ives watched me with alarm as I took a drink. “You said the game had changed; what do you mean? You exchanged more than guns, sex partners, targets and subject matters in missions, right? In the final stage, what did you exchange?”

“Lives,” the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird said.

After that, none of us spoke. I watched the other killer in the room, who had moved to sit next to me after saying those words. When Ives stood to open a window, he was leaning in naturally to rest his head on my shoulder, closing his eyes.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> translator's note: brief mention of use of marijuana in this chapter

"One night, ten months later," I said, "I screwed up."

“Yes, the Wilkin case,” the FBI agent said. “I remember.”

“First the mission failed, and shortly after that, I couldn’t reach my client anymore. Not only didn’t I get the money, but I became the target myself. Every once in a while, there’d be one of those horrible nights like a penny in your wallet you can’t spend. In fact, the two parties in the business had already shaken hands without my knowledge, and only afterwards did I know I was just a pawn in a dirty game: I got sold.”

“You kill people for a living, Stanley,” came Ives’s instant reply. “You should’ve seen it coming.”

“Maybe you’re right. Perhaps,” I said. “It’s just like that in our business. The night before you were probably still enjoying the best steak in some high-class restaurant, and the next morning you have nothing with you – except for several bullet wounds – after paying the gas money, and you have to ask for a phone call for free in an off-the-map gas station. That night, it was raining cats and dogs, and the only thing I had with me that was worth some money was a gun. My car broke, and there was a body I couldn’t get rid of in the trunk. When I got hold of that sooty telephone in the gas station, my teeth were clattering like a broken man’s. I hadn’t lost my consciousness, not that I didn’t want to, but I didn’t allow myself to pass out. You see, the mission had ended badly, but I hadn’t admitted defeat. I called a number and waited, half-asleep, half-awake.”

“At least you had someone to turn to. That means you hadn’t completely lost.”

I shrugged. “For the record,” I said, “I was not sure at all if the number was still in use. It was ten month ago when I got the number. During these months, we never talked. Last time I met the owner of the number, it was on a yacht, and we had a falling-out. Not the high-school-kids kind of falling out, but the you’re-my-sworn-nemesis-after-this kind. There was no frame of reference for things like this, so I couldn’t tell if I overreacted. I mean, how many killers are there hanging around with their fellows? Probably only this dumbass sleeping next to me.”

“I heard that,” the man who was leaning against my shoulders mumbled.

I shrugged, taking my gaze off Neil’s face. “He acted like he didn’t care about Kat’s life, which aggravated me. But deal’s a deal; I couldn’t refuse to hand her over to this guy. I was convinced she was going to die, but after a while, I couldn’t help but ask around a bit. She’s alive and well. Ever since then, I started to regret our breakup. I just couldn’t believe it at that time; I told myself, so that bastard, who looked detached, immovable and sometimes crazy, did have a heart. He risked his life to save Kat and her son, just like I risked mine to rescue your life. Of all the people in this world, there’s another man like me, an –” I glanced at Neil. “– emotionally driven fool.”

“I heard _that_ too,” Neil repeated.

“You realized you made a mistake,” Ives raised his eyebrows. “But you still hadn’t made the move to restore contact with him.”

I didn’t answer, which was an unspoken yes. I reached for the bottle, and Ives eyed me with amused interest. “Now,” he urged, “talk about the worst night in your life. I have a feeling I’ll have a good time listening to it.”

I took a drink. Whisky had run out; I didn’t know where Ives got the Brandy, but I didn’t care. I gulped down the liquor, feeling it burn, moving carefully to avoid Neil’s wounds.

“The call was picked up. I said: ‘I know it probably isn’t the best time for this? – but I need help.’ And on the other side of the call, the man was silent for a while before answering: ‘wait there for me.’ Just like that. No unnecessary chitchat, no inquiries about my whereabouts; he just told me what to do with certainty, which was exactly what I needed. I went back into the car, rolled up the window and closed my eyes. When I was about to fall asleep, the car arrived. The headlights lit up my view, and I just stared fixedly at the scene. Everything felt like a dream. I couldn’t move, couldn’t wake up, until he bent down next to the driver's side and knocked twice sharply on the window.”

“Things after that were almost reflexive. I didn’t think at all, just let my body tell me what to do. I stepped out the car, closed the door, followed the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird into his car. He didn’t try to take me by the arm or ask me where I was injured, which was a real relief. He just opened the door for me. I did the rest of it myself. I got into the passenger’s seat in silence, and watched in silence, as he left me there and walked towards my car. I saw it in my blurry vision that he was pouring gasoline on it. His execution was methodical and unhurried, as if it wasn’t gas but ointment for some kind of baptism. It was the target’s car, so we couldn’t keep it, and for some unknown reason, he was fully aware of that. He took a step back after he was done with the gasoline, arched his hand, and lit up a cigarette. I watched him. On a night like that, everything he did, with calmness and logic, had a soothing effect. He took his time to finish the cigarette, holding his finger together to flick off the cigarette butt, then turned around and left the fire behind him in steady steps. When the fire started to rise up, he was already in the driver’s seat. I turned my head to look at his profile – all this time, my eyes couldn’t seem to leave his face. He hit the gas, and the noise of the car starting reminded me. That moment, I realized I could finally relax: he would take care of everything.”

“He lent you a hand.”

“He went there for me,” I corrected, “he appeared when I needed it most, which is important. No one ever went so far as that for me; they tended to abandon me, sell me out and leave me, not to become my backup. As time went by, I had got used to not relying on anybody at all. I was my own backup, and that was that. Want to know why I got into the business? I used to work for the CIA; there was a manhunt where I was betrayed and my whole team were killed. After that I left my job and became who you see now.”

Ives didn’t answer, and I smiled at him. “I forgot who I was talking to. Of course you know; it’s all in my files.” I let more self-deprecation show in my tone. “You used to be in the military, and you must have experienced something similar, so you'll know what I'm talking about - You were discharged for similar reasons, after an IED [1] killed your team members, weren’t you? I stopped expecting to trust others a long time ago, Ives.”

“But the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird is different.” Ives said. “Why?”

“I don’t know. All I know is that after that night, the thing between us entered a new stage. All the disagreements seemed to disappear on their own, as if we never argued,” I said. “That night, after I got in his car, we didn’t talk. I didn’t ask him where he was taking me, and he didn’t ask what kind of trouble I got myself into. Roads after roads flashed past our eyes, and in the end, I couldn’t feel the time passing anymore. When we stopped at the first gas station, something about the place felt wrong. Some people were leaning on the wall chatting, and they looked high and looking for fun. Normally I wouldn't worry about this kind of trouble, but I’d lost too much blood at that time, and couldn’t fight any of them. They picked Neil when he drove into the station. Neil parked the car and was ready to get out, when I put a hand on his arm. He turned back and our eyes met – the first time we met eyes since the burning car. He shot me a derisive look. I leaned forward over the seat to lower my head with eagerness, to kiss his lips. But actually, underneath the dashboard, my hand caught his and stuffed an object inside. His hand trembled a little but then caught the gun in a steady grasp. Both were first times: the first time I kissed him, the first time I handed over the only sidearm that I had to the other person, giving myself up to let him decide my fate. Where the others could see, I broke the kiss with affectionate reluctance, and in the corners where they couldn’t see, I cupped his hand, helping him hold the gun. He took in a deep breath, and stared at me for a few seconds. When he finally opened the door and got off, I’d told him everything about that gun.”

“It was a .32 auto,” the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird added, somnolent, “with a nickel-plated barrel. About two inches long, didn’t have much kickback, felt heavy but actually light. It was Mahir’s production. The guy smuggles guns by boat, and he’s the only one who’d melt down the identification number like that. But those were just some superficial facts. When he lifted my wrist, he told me its range; when adjusting my finger to let it touch the trigger, he told me its calibre. When he pushed the gun into my palm, and made my palm slip from the joint of the magazine and the barrel to the slide, I figured out the approximate number of the bullets left. Everything was conveyed through a grasp of the palm. Pretty dramatic,” he stopped, licked his lower lip and blushed, his eyes bright. “I think it was the first time he offered his own gun, and the first time that he kissed me.”

I tilted my head and smiled at him. I tucked his coat around him, and the room fell quiet again.

“The –” Ives gestured for the words he omitted, “– in the gas station, how ’bout them?”

“Don’t worry, they didn’t die,” I said. “if you go to the place, you can probably meet the same people there. We did take some of their weed, was that a crime? I really needed a smoke, so I just grabbed some. If you’re going to sue me for that, I think I probably deserve it.”

“Easy, cowboy,” Ives said, sharp but honest, “I’m not desperate enough to sue you with theft.”

“It wasn’t theft,” Neil smiled faintly. “I just pointed a gun on their heads and asked them to hand it over themselves. They’d rob us anyway, or do something worse. Can I –”

He looked up at Ives. When given the other’s approval, he lay down, resting his head against my thigh. He moved slowly, as if he was afraid he’d press on some painful wound. Ives asked something, but I shook my head at him mutely. Not until Neil closed his eyes again and started to breathe steadily did I take my eyes off his face. I looked over at Ives, gestured to let him ask the question, but he was regarding me with a brand-new kind of look.

“Jesus,” his tone sounded almost pitying. “Who would’ve thought. You can’t leave him anymore, can you?”

“Shh,” I said. “Be quiet. I think the painkiller is working. At least he can sleep now.”

“Sleep won’t solve his problem.” Ives cast a glance at Neil. “He’s in love with you. That’s his problem.”

I stared at him, dumbstruck. “What?” He looked at me, disbelieving. “It never came to you?”

“You’re off the point.”

“Alright, then we’ll get on the _point_ ,” Ives lowered his voice as I asked, “I’ll make a guess: he found a hideout for you, then took care of the body for you. But what I’m interested in the most isn’t the body – can’t believe _I_ said that – but the latest developments of this assassin alliance of yours.”

“He took me somewhere and let me settle down. He stayed for the first night; the next morning when I woke up, he was already gone. Part of me did worry. I suspected that he had ditched me, or, you know, told the police,” I said. “my reason and my survival instincts were battling. I told myself: if I notice one trace of evidence indicating that he’s sold me out, I’ll go. I waited until that night when there was a knock on the door. He was back. His face was injured, and he didn’t explain where he’d been, just smiled when I opened the door, holding up the bag of takeout in his hand. Not until the next morning when I saw the newspapers did I know the Wilkins and their bounty weren’t a problem anymore – someone took them out last night, with a .32 auto. I finished reading the news, and looked up at the person sitting across from me. He suddenly smiled and said, ‘what?’

“‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘For the newspapers, I mean.’

“He shrugged. ‘Pays to be in our profession,’ he said.

“I didn’t ask if he killed Wilkin. There had been a new kind of tacit understanding between us; lots of things no longer needed to be stated explicitly. Ever since then, although the police were still looking for me, the risks I was faced with were significantly lower. I could’ve gone.”

“But?”

“But I stayed, until my wounds healed,” I said. “And I think this had been decided on the first night, although we never really talked about it – it had been decided when I handed over the gun, and let him disarm me completely and send me to bed naked like a new-born.”

“I feel that this counted as an exchange, too,” said Ives. “Though he didn’t really give you a gun.”

“Oh, he did,” I said. “It was the middle of the night; he drove across half the city just to find a doctor that was willing to come to the house and treat me, so he didn’t owe me anything. And the day I completely recovered, he let me fuck him without any weapons on him; if you know what it means for people like us, you’ll see the significance of it. He also took some of my jobs in my stead to clear my name while I was rehabilitating – that was when we got that idea.”

“What kind of idea?” Ives asked.

“We can exchange our identities,” I concluded with this daring sentence, “so no one would ever be able to catch us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] IED: short for "improvised explosive device".


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> translator’s note: description of temporary deprivation of oxygen under water (and light asphyxiation play related to it) in this chapter

_He took half a step backwards, scanning around him. There was no one in the corridor; he’d lost the woman with a poodle who entered the lift with him. He held up one hand in front of his chest, arching it to cover the gun that was already aimed at the lock. The gun was in his other hand, the silencer fully tightened on the muzzle, still with the delusional smell of gunpowder from the last mission. His right index finger closed steadily around the trigger, the series of manoeuvres as natural as trying to breathe. He counted his heartbeat to five; lowered the left hand; straightened the right arm; calculated the distance between him and the lock. He saw the watch-wearing wrist raised in the dark, in alignment with the front sight on the gun. The lower his right hand pressed down, the more still his other hand was holding up in a slope, an unremitting ten inch from the Glock. His attention was primarily on the spare hand; it was to prevent others from seeing the muzzle, and the small-sized 9mm bullets from bursting out of the lock cylinder. As for the gun itself, it had become an intuition, practically part of his body. Even when the corridor was this quiet, the noise made by the gun wouldn’t be more audible than a balloon popping. He tilted his head slightly, aiming at the alarm lock that was glowing in the darkness, holding his breath despite himself._

_A flash in the corner of his view distracted him for a moment. He glanced at his right hand. The hummingbird was resting serenely on his finger._ Draw out the cigarette you carry with you, _he thought of the other person’s words._ Light it but don’t take a smoke – you don’t want to leave any DNA at the scene, trust me – hold the burning end close to the ring, let it heat for a while, then leave the mark on the selected place. Normally it’ll only take you ten to twenty seconds. The smell of burnt skin will remain in the inner circle of the ring, I’ll tell you how to get rid of it some other time; are you listening? _And he gulped, suddenly realising he wasn’t here on his own behalf, and the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird – the flash disappeared. He was still standing in the shadow beside the door, but he took some time to regather his disturbed rhythm. He thought of the man’s alluring murmur; of the lips, in the damp darkness across the room, breathing and blossoming like a rose; the words had come from those lips like a fever, had made him stagger in lethargy, but unable to stop listening. “Heat it slowly, and uniformly,” the person said softly, “like caressing a woman. Make it hot; make it wet. Get on it the target’s skin, flesh and blood – you’ll get the hang of it; patience is the key.”_

_He could still somehow feel the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird’s breath by his ear, the soft, slow breathing when he talked, and how the pair of strong thighs clutched around his waist when the man explained all of this to him, the ringed right hand pressing right on his shoulder. Here and now, he could almost feel the other one leaning against his back, holding his wrist telling him how to use the gun, and he gritted his teeth to fight off the illusion, lust swelling in him like a tide, making his stomach clench all of a sudden. He turned his face away and moved a little to the side, as though out of habit, although the man named the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird wasn’t really standing behind him. To calm the unfathomable anger in his chest, he took in a breath, and exhaled slowly. He readjusted the muzzle, in a hastier way than before. The swift adjustments didn’t make any sound, as he didn’t forget – the real Ruby-Throated Hummingbird was listening on the other end of the earpiece, and without doubt he could hear every movement he made. He closed his eyes, keeping his right hand as out of sight as possible so he didn’t need to see the reflection of the ring. The foremost of the silencer was pressed on the keyhole, the cylinder and the bore aligned in a straight line, and he was going to –_

_“What are you doing?” In his ear, the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird ordered, “put the gun away. I’ll tell you how to open the lock.”_

_“Excuse me,” he frowned. “Are you telling me what to do with my own gun?”_

_“I won’t allow you to fire at a locked door,” the voice in his ear was patient and persuasive, “at least you can’t when you’re me. We’ve established that in the very beginning, one is expected to obey all the instructions of the other. This is to protect our covers – if you shoot at a lock, everyone will know it isn’t me.”_

_So he lowered his body, his ear pressing against the heavy wooden door. He gripped the narrow steel bar and reached it into the crack of the door, turning his waist, trying to pluck the tumbler that he couldn’t see. The indeterminate, unfamiliar challenge soon made his palms sweat, but it all got swallowed by the rubber glove. His breath was so distinct in the silence, accompanied by the beating of his own heart. The beam of light from the flashlight slid along the crack, turning into shoals of capering fish._ Bite it, _was what the other person had told him:_ hold on it, but don’t suck it down too deep. _The teasing had been slightly apologetic, so he knew the other person wasn’t completely unaware of the_ double entendre _in his ambiguous wording. The same thing happened when he had to pluck out the last latch; the chain was swinging on the other side of the keyhole, resisting the gentle push of his fingers, but he just couldn’t pinpoint its location. He frowned and took a breath. The other killer noticed, and seemed to realize what was going on at his end without him saying it out loud. “Keep your hands steady,” the lazy voice sounded sleepy, as if picking the lock was the easiest thing in this world. “And forget about the alarm. Relax your shoulder.” I can’t, he replied through gnashing teeth; the unfamiliar overture – standing in the corridor, with an alarm that could be triggered at any minute – made him nervous. His breath became heavy. Sweat made his palms slippery. Just as he was going to give up, the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird’s tone changed, as if they were pressing against each other._ Imagine what you’re opening is me. I feel your fingers, but you need to be more patient _– the grainy voice couldn’t be more fitting –_ don’t be so rude, no one likes a rude entry, Stanley. Reach in gently, yes, that’s right, find the place where I can be opened for you, then turn your wrist, fill me with your fingers. Hear it turn inwards? That means you’re doing it right. Now move.

What? _He said, gritting his teeth, seeing the solid chest and wet lips of the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird in his head._ Take it back, then thrust it forward again, _the other person said, tender,_ until I was opened wide for you. Now, does it feel a lot smoother? Turn off the flashlight; you can get in now.

 _He could; but the first thing he needed to collect was his breath. For a moment, he just stood there, fingers curling into his palms, chest heaving helplessly. He wasn’t sure if the other could hear his perturbed breath, the noise he made when unnaturally moving his body, and the way he swallowed around his Adam’s apple. Before raising his hand to push the door, his fingers rubbed quietly over the ring, as if it could bring him some comfort. Lust wrapped his body like a thin layer of sweat, making him doubtful how he could make it to the end of the mission. He’d never got hard this fast, this desperately, in such an inopportune way. The door creaked open, and he sidled in, pushed it with two hands to make it firmly shut, and leaned against it, panting._ For God’s sake, _were the only words in his mind,_ that Goddamn fucker.

I forgot to mention, _the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird said in a business-like tone,_ the target owns a safe, in which he keeps the guns he’s seized these years. My gun is inside, too. You can masturbate with it, if you can open the safe, and find out which one of the guns is mine.

“I did,” I said. “It was a Hellcat [1]. A woman’s gun. It was most definitely a revenge.”

Ives laughed, completely unsympathetically. “Then?” He sounded a little drunk, but so did I.

I shook my head. “You wouldn’t want to know.”

“I think I already know,” Ives said. “You took the gun away with you, because that was what Neil would do.”

“That would be afterwards,” I said. “Alright, you really wanna know? I opened the safe – with the assistance of someone, of course – and spotted the gun at first sight. But I didn’t expect what happened next myself, either. I knew the target wouldn’t be back for another thirty minutes, so I locked myself in the bathroom, and –”

“Fuck,” Ives interrupted.

“Yeah,” I nodded gravely.

“I mean –” Ives said, “– fuck.”

“ _Fuck_ is what I’m saying,” I said. “the slide of a Hellcat will have a slot on it; it’s for the red-dot sight. It counts more or less as a feature of the model. The gun lying in the safe had a red-dot sight on it. Normally I won’t use it, I’m not someone who likes to have a lot of gadgets on my guns, but then, my body was in the hand of someone else, who owned control of it. He made me make use of it, and I’m not talking about aiming. He –” Neil raised a hand and pulled at my sleeve. I lowered my head to study his face. Was he being shy? Because we were in the same interrogation room, or because we were in front of the only FBI he trusted? When our eyes met, he licked his lower lips, and drew back his hand awkwardly. “– anyway, I was let go after _emptying the loads_ ,” I said, “And I took the gun.”

“Did it work?” Ives said. “The job. Did anyone mistake you for him?”

“Oh, almost everyone,” I said flippantly. “The Lexington Herald-Leader – they were the first to report the case, Mahir – my arms supplier, and Crosby – he was in charge of the case. I think it was exactly because he ‘believed’ in this that he was promoted so quickly, which sounds ironic in retrospect.”

“And why is that?”

I cast a glimpse at Neil – who was silently pleading with his eyes – and calmly changed the subject. “But it wasn’t enough,” I said. “We had to fool everyone, even people who were the closest to us. Briefly acting as a character is different than truly becoming each other. It involves millions of details; any kind of error can blow your cover. To accomplish it needs time, lots of time. I’m saying it’s a process.”

“How long did you take?”

“Twenty-seven months,” I said. “During which we seldom met, unless we had no choice. We never lived together, either. We both agreed that if we were going to do this, it’d be better that we didn’t cross paths with each other again.”

“Which means you trained him, too,” Ives pointed out. “You must have had your revenge during those twenty-seven months. How did you ‘turn him into you’? Other than telling him to keep everything in his own hands and never trust anyone?”

I stopped telling the story. Ives followed my gaze towards the man lying on my lap. The other protagonist in the story kept his eyes closed, groaning. “I can fill in this part,” he said. “If you can tolerate my style – I don’t think I can keep myself awake the whole time. I think the fever’s deprived me of the ability to speak coherently.”

I looked over at Ives. Ives nodded.

_**The seventh exchange** _

_It was late, the swimming pool an oil painting that waited desperately to be finished, that was occasionally added a few strokes to by the reflection of lights sweeping across the water. The current swathed around his limbs, pressed on his knees, and conspired with his body. Time passed as he held his breath, his limbs feeling increasingly heavy in the water. The water was chasmic, motionless, his mouth and nose blocked by an ever-so-faint smell of chlorine. His hair was tangled like seaweed, his arms completely numb, the feeling of hypoxia squeezing his body like a rock hanging from his chest. The truth was, he could just kick the water beneath him, and the thrust of the legs could make him easily rise to the surface, but his identity at the moment didn’t allow him to do that. Now, he was another person, someone who would hide in the water on a night like this, just to wait for the right moment to kill. A hunter. In silence, he felt his throat tighten, as if the other man’s hands were pressing against it, when a ray of light penetrated the surface of the water; it was the flashlight in the patrolling security’s hand. He immediately tried to swim to the ground to avoid it, and one of his hands had already touched the wall of the pool. But by his ear, a chiding voice stopped him._ It’s not been sixty seconds yet, _the voice scolded._ Be patient, Neil, and consider this to be a breath control play. Are you hard? Then don’t come until I release you, hold your breath for me – good. My fingers are pressed against your carotid arteries, restraining the blood flow, can you feel it? Bear it a little longer for me – stay where you are.

 _He could hear his blood pumping in his eardrum. He was so close to his limits that he was almost half-hard for it. If he swam out of the water right now, his desire would be exposed by his reddened body on his elbows, knees and knuckles. Heat rose from the underside of his eyes, and the feeling of suffocation amassing in his chest made him press his lips together._ Ten more seconds, _the voice in his ear said, teasing._ We’ve practiced this a lot; you won’t want to undo our efforts now. You can’t cheat and kill him by naked choke, Neil, at least you can’t when you’re me.

_He bit down a harsh retort like a lump in the throat. His face gradually turned red. To stay conscious, he tried hard to think about other things. In his earpiece, the other killer’s voice made him think of how the other taught him to fire underwater – not his field of expertise; reloading in water presented some challenges, and it took longer to aim. In the training pool, the other had lifted his arms, had calibrated his motion with care, as if he’d become a rustling pile of hay. After a day’s training came to an end, the long-stretched want for orgasm always made his legs weak, and he had to take a moment to breathe before he got out of the water. At this moment, what he saw through the water overlapped with the dimming circles of light. He blinked, his eyelid heavy and sore, and heard the man in his earpiece begin to count down from five. The patrol left the swimming pool holding his flashlight, and the sudden relaxation almost made him choke on a mouthful of water._

_The current gathered around his head. For a moment he panicked and feared that he would never succeed. He was used to his body being the weapon, not using a weapon, but judo, Brazilian jiu-jitsu or the long-term training couldn’t help him at this moment. A small amount of water entered his lungs, making him almost lose his balance, and one of his flailing arms must have disturbed the surface. If he had moved more vigorously, someone would notice, and the mission that they’d prepared for three days – two days of preliminary inspection and one day of stakeout – would fail._

Don’t panic, _the man said._ You’re close; last longer for me. Don’t think about how much time is left, just listen to me. When the time is up, swim over, don’t let anyone see you. Shoot from underwater, drag the target into the pool, discard your weapon, and climb onto the ground. When the disturbance starts, you change your clothes and leave as planned. Imagine that you’re a gun. I’m holding you; you’re safe; I know how to use you – now, Neil.

_He pulled the trigger, swam for a distance, and surfaced. He heard himself panting desperately, and felt his cheeks burn, partly because of the hard-won oxygen, but mostly because of the words. Use you, the man had said. The target was drowning in the water; blood on the surface started to become visible. He gave himself one minute, diving into the water, which leisurely went over his lips._

_“Tell me.”_

_“I’m done,” he said boldly, making no effort to disguise the innuendo, “but I’m all wet, too.”_

_The other end of the comms went silent for a moment, then there was a low laugh. “Find the target’s arms depot, and perhaps I’ll let you pick a gun from it,” the other man said. “If you find the hostage in my way, I’ll let you ride it – I don’t suppose you need me to instruct you in how to ride something hard enough – but only if you disarm the bomb.”_

“I didn’t _ride it_ , I think,” the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird said. “Just touching it made me come. This filthy story bores you, doesn’t it, Ives? Sorry I don’t have a more decent story to tell.”

“Well, there must be a reason for you to stall like that,” Ives said. “Although I fail to see it.”

“Always so considerate. I’m glad you left, Ives, you deserve someone better.”

“Wait,” I interrupted with a scowl. “Did you –”

“We were together, once, but it was completely irrelevant to what’s happening in this room. If I were you, I wouldn’t ask too many questions,” Ives said. “Back to the topic. In this exchange, you didn’t find anything that surprised you? Getting so close to a person, it’s inevitable you’ll touch some secrets, something unexpected.”

I tightened my lips, curling up their corners, putting on a forced expression of a smile. “The final month, he told me: ‘there’s something about me that you need to know before this ends. Remember old Randolph? I lived there, before I turned twelve. It was you who took me out of the place. You brought me home, like bringing home a stray dog.’”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [1] (original footnote:) The Springfield Armory Hellcat, a model of semi-automatic pistol.


	12. Chapter 12

  
_He was going to leave that room._

_Everyone was counting down in the hall. He could seize the opportunity and sneak out, go into the kitchen, steal two cookies and grab a ginger ale to feed himself, and run into the backyard through the service exit. He had tested the route for a couple of times: he can climb into the garage all the way from there. Once they were convinced that he locked himself in the garage by accident again, they’d give up searching him. They wouldn’t, either, force him to shower and force him to put on clean clothes to meet that person. He’d been preparing for this for months, and the New Year party was his best chance. The guests would start to leave after the countdown. If he got the timing right, and they didn’t notice, he could easily climb into the trunk of a couple’s car. The tipsy Andrewses would start the car completely oblivious, and then he can lie on his side in the dark to leave this place._

_He repeated the procedure above over and over again in his head, while climbing to the closet on all fours. The New Year bell had just rung out, which was the signal for him to move. The moment he touched the crack in the closet door, and just about to fumble the door open, the light was turned on, and someone opened the room door. He held his breath, swiftly retreating into the dark and finding a corner to sit down, eyes watching warily what was outside the closet. The door had opened by a few inches, and light had rushed in. He put his chin on his lap, and his arms carefully around his ankle. Through the crack in the closet, he saw two men walking into the room one following the other, one of them turning and closing the door. The man who took the lead, he knew, but he’d never seen the man following him. He sat there, his heart pounding, reaching a hand unconsciously to grab the tail of his pyjama. He looked out, blinking his eyes. The stranger made him feel in danger, made him want to hide, to not be exposed in this man’s eyes too soon. And the other person – his heartbeat rushed for a second after he recognized the face – was Henry Stanton, to whom Randolph gave him as a present – after tonight’s party, he was supposed to follow this guy home. For a second, he thought Stanton was looking for him. When the guy entered the room in long, eager steps, he almost lost the ability to breathe. However, Stanton was pale and covered in sweat, glancing all over the room with two panicky eyes; the man ran into this room as if more to escape from something than to look for prey. He kept his own back against the closet wall, gnawing at his fingernails, fretting, while it slowly came to him that what Stanton was afraid of was the man behind him, who had been standing behind Stanton’s back in a relaxed posture._

_“I can pay back the money,” Stanton’s voice was scared and shrill, like a dog caught in a foothold trap. “I’ve still got a few properties on the Upper West Side! I can get some cash! Tell – tell whoever sent you I can make up for everything! Just give me a little more time!”_

_The other’s answer made him shiver. The voice was unimpressed, and if anything, faintly mocking. “Too late,” the man said._

_The man didn’t move, but Stanton walked backwards, thumped against the closet and slipped down to the floor, blocking his view. He heard him breathe heavily like a bull, the body that in his memory had been so large now seemed strengthless, and Stanton spoke with a sob._

_“Don’t kill me,” Stanton pleaded, “please… Don’t… I have money… I can give you money!”_

_He stared in wide eyes at the word_ kill _, immediately biting at the back of his hand to stifle a shout. He probably should be scared, but he mostly felt curious. Did the man crouch down? Everything around him suddenly became dimmer. Stanton’s elbow hit the closet, a pair of weak, flabby legs kicking around on the floor._ Weird, _he thought,_ the other man hasn’t done anything yet, but Stanton is already beaten to the ground by fear. _He heard a scornful snort. “I’m not here for a chat, Henry. Behave yourself. Don’t make this too hard.”_

_Like a cork popping out of a champagne bottle, there was a soft noise in the air. In the silent, sweltering room, Stanton trembled a little, and stilled forever. He curled himself in the corner, swallowing. His brain couldn’t comprehend what had happened on Stanton, as he was, after all, only twelve; he only knew that he probably shouldn’t shout out. He hid his face in the darkness, as far away from the door as possible. He prayed he still hadn't been discovered by this stranger. The corpse was moving, was making short, rustling noises like a tree. It took him a while to register that it was the stranger searching Stanton’s body. It was an opportunity; he could climb away on his hands and knees and hide himself into a coat, thereby making himself completely invisible, but he was frozen and unable to do that. The opportunity was gone in a minute: the stranger stood up, turned the body around with his foot, and looked down at Stanton’s face. That tangible gaze swept past the closet, and for a moment he thought the other one saw him there. But the footsteps went away from the closet and made their way to the bathroom. The man was washing off the blood on his hand. Almost a century had passed before he walked over again, calm and unruffled. Though he just saw this person for the first time, he doubted he would ever forget the face. The person bent down, grabbed the body by the collar and moved Stanton to the carpet like a bag of flour. He did it so effortlessly as if the body had no weight. What would happen next? He waited anxiously in the dark. He shouldn’t have stared, but his curiosity was swelling and the fear was drowned out. He found himself studying the man’s face with concentration, along with the used gun in his hand._

_Just at the moment when he was intrigued by the deadly toy in the man’s hand, the closet door was pulled open by a pair of leather-gloved hands. He didn’t have the time to hide away, and fell, as a whole, into the eyes of that adult who was blocking his way out. They looked at each other for a moment. He raised his head. Some sort of communication was exchanged between them like two adults. He blinked, thoughtfully watching the person who had made Henry Stanton so scared, taking in everything by instinct: the scent on the man’s body, his hands, face, and the slow, even breaths. The adult was regarding him focusedly, too, and there was some sort of disbelief in his eyes, as if he was surprised that there was someone who wasn’t afraid of him._

_“What are you going to do with me?” he asked._

_“I have no idea,” answered the man._

_“Because – I saw your face.” He pursed his lips, and answered after moments of hesitation._

_“That I know.” The man nodded solemnly, his expression serious, as if he wasn’t seeing him as a child._

_He glanced at the corpse. “The thing you did to Stanton,” he had an idea. “Can you do it for me? I don’t have money, but I can tell you the password to old Randolph’s safe. He changed his password every fortnight, you just need to find the next numbers according to the Fibonacci sequence. The next change was at midnight tonight, I’ll tell you how to do it.”_

_He avoided the word_ kill _. He chose his wording prudently, like it was a negotiation. The man seemed very interested in him._

_“You don’t want to live anymore? Why?”_

_“I never asked you why you did that to Stanton,” he was a little annoyed now, and the annoyance took over the timidness for a second. “You don’t have much time left, because the patrolling guys will come by very soon. Take me away or take me out, you have to make the decision immediately.”_

_“What an unusual kid,” the smiling eyes winked at him. “How did you know I had seen you?”_

_“When you said, ‘behave yourself’,” he said, hesitant. The stranger was even more intimidating when he smiled; the smile made him swallow a little. “And you gave me some time, to see if I’d run away when you were in the bathroom.”_

_“Then why didn’t you run away?” The sharp glance swept across his face again. “I never knew the Randolphs had a kid.”_

_“I’m not –” he trembled. “– I’m a present that someone else gave him. He was meaning to send me away again.”_

_The man sighed, and squatted down to look at him. His face looked conflicted, as if he was persuading himself. “Do you have a name?”_

_“Neil.” He said._

_“Neil,” the hand reached out to pat on his head. “I can see you’re hungry. I’m hungry too. Come on, let’s leave this place.”_

_He went out of the wardrobe, sniffing with uncertainty, but he got scooped off the ground. The man patted his own belly, slumped his shoulder and made a funny face at him. He giggled despite himself. His eyes caught the holster on the man’s shoulder, hidden in his overcoat, just barely in sight. This was a dangerous person, probably more dangerous than anyone he’d met, and he just witnessed the person kill someone. But he was very satisfied with this new ally. He was sure this stranger would be the lift he was getting to leave this place, and when they arrived at somewhere safe, he’d look for a chance to escape again. Then, he would be free. Going over all of this in his head, he rested his forehead on the other’s shoulder, feigning sleep. He made himself breath evenly, turned to hallways after hallways hidden in the other’s coat, and just when he almost convinced himself that he could fall asleep, something was stuffed in his arms, and the stranger tugged at his fingers to loosen his grasp, teaching him how to hold the thing._ Don’t be afraid, I didn’t take the safety off. Do you know how to fire a gun? _The other asked. He shook his head._

_“This is yours now,” this strange stranger said. “point it at the idiots who tell me to stop. They’ll be very scared.”_

_He had to use both his hands to get hold of the gun, but he didn’t let go. It felt mysterious. Cold, hard, the bloodstain on it bright with reflection. His fingers found a place and pulled, as if the gun had always belonged to him, although he had no idea how to use it. He thought about the shivering body of Stanton’s, his sob, his shoes kicking around violently on the floor, and he thought in amazement how powerful this object was, although it was not so much bigger than the hand of an adult._ Looks like you’re a natural shooter, _the man commented._ I’ll teach you how to fire some other day. _The words confused him, but they were oddly comforting. He held one arm around the man’s shoulder, another hand holding the gun. When someone asked them to stop, the stranger taught him how to raise the hand, raise the barrel and aim it at the person’s face. The person's expression shifted and stumbled backwards. He witnessed the change, and couldn’t understand._ They’re scared of you, _he said._ No, they’re just scared of the gun in my hand, _the man answered._ The clever ones can tell the difference, and the dumb ones destroy themselves in arrogance. Remember: your first gun is yourself.

And what followed was silence.

“According to him,” I said, “ _that_ is the first time I meet him. In the future.”

“What do you think?”

“According to him,” I repeated the phrase to accentuate the sarcasm, “my future self becomes a fanatic, a lone wolf, some guy who thinks he’s undefeatable. I take him away from Randolph’s house, and teach him everything, and he becomes a killer. Years after that, he reads something about me in the newspapers. Specifically, my obituary.”

“Shit,” said Ives.

“Although we’ve already stopped contacting each other by then,” I went on, uninterrupted by Ives, “he still cares how I died. So he puts down the newspaper and starts to retrace the past, wanting to find out what initiated everything that lead me to an ending like that – and his conclusion is that I need a friend who can always be by my side, so the loneliness won’t overwhelm me, and I won’t risk to take more and more challenging jobs and be eventually eaten by my audacity. Did I say _friend_? It’s just the general meaning; he used an odd Greek word. I can’t recall how to pronounce it. Everything about his story is odd.”

“Philoi,” Neil said. “That word.”

“Sure,” I curled up the corner of my mouth. “Anyway, our Mr Hummingbird is convinced that I can be saved this way, just like how I saved him in those days.”

“You don’t believe him?” Ives said.

I shrugged. “I thought he was making things up,” I said. “To convince me he had gone all out. If such a story could convince himself, who was I to object? Besides, I got a nice role to play in the story.”

“But you changed your mind, right? When did you begin to believe?”

“He told me how he chose his targets,” I didn’t answer until after a very long time. “They all belonged to the same club – Randolph, and other people – and he had always devoted himself to finding out every member of the club. Every time when he found out one of them, he wouldn’t let the person die straight away. He’d do all he could to make the person spit out a name – the branding was one way to do it; and on that night, how I read out the list of names in front of Randolph, it was another way. When a name was out, it’d give out more names, and so on. It’s an anonymous club. They’re all recommended to get in – everyone has their own recommender, and vice versa. Every time when he got a name, that person became the target.”

Suddenly, Ives realized something. “Are you saying – you want me to believe Sutherland was in the club as well.”

“He was the founder.”

“No he wasn’t.”

“Michael Sutherland always wore a ring, and on it was his family’s coat of arms, wasn’t it? Wrong; the word Sylph was behind the ring,” I said. “It was the name of the club – and also the name of a kind of hummingbird, believe it or not.”

“Let’s put that aside for the time being,” Ives’s face was livid. “Back to exchanging identities. What did he do to make you believe him?”

“After the ‘bootcamp’, we had a test-drive.”

“A test-drive,” Ives repeated, as if to ridicule my choice of words.

“He took a commission under my identity, and let somebody spot him on purpose. You caught me, and put me into the room with the one-way glass. Looked like an indubitable case. The D.A.’s office was thrilled; so was the prosecuting counsel. But after seeing all the people in the room, the witness shook her head honestly. The person I saw isn’t in there, she told the police. The case was cancelled; the test-drive was thus a success. We dated for the very first time to celebrate. Not the kind of date you’d imagine. We went to the same restaurant, but with different people. No one in the same restaurant at that time, even a private investigator, could make the connection between us, because we only met eyes for a brief moment when we raised our glass.”

“That doesn’t count as a date,” Ives said.

“But we exchanged guns in the restroom,” I said, “which made it a date. I pushed him into the restroom, pressed him against the wall, and took away his gun. Then I prepared his body, put the holster and the tie back on him for him, and loaded the weapon that I gave him. He let me; his body was like a gun lying there waiting to be loaded. Then he did the same thing to me. I was sure I could still feel the bite of his teeth on the side of my neck when I straightened my tie in front of the mirror; he pushed a leg in between mine, and squeezed me hard as he put the gun back on the small of my back, almost making me curse. The rest of the night, I couldn’t forget how he was kneeling there, and he kissed the gun before handing it to me, his eyes were bright, teasing, his tongue curling around the muzzle.”

Neil had fallen into his shallow sleep, a hand subconsciously holding mine; his breath had become softer. I flashed Ives a self-mocking smile.

“We got into our respective taxis,” I said, “on our ‘last rides’ with our respective partners. But later that night, he was in my bed, just like right now, his eyes closed, and my hand could easily touch his hair. ‘I know about your first time,’ he said. ‘Not news,’ I smiled, ‘I told you before; the silencer –’ 

“No – he interrupted me – that wasn’t your first time. Your first time wasn’t killing some CIA officer with your military rationed silencer, although that guy did hold responsibility for your teammates’ death. No, your first time was way before that, when you weren’t a lot older then than me when you discovered me, and what you used wasn’t a gun but your own hands.

“I was shocked. ‘How did you know all of this?’ I asked. And guess what was his answer?”

“‘You told me’,” Ives said.

“No one knew about it,” I nodded. “No one knew I strangled my foster father when I was sixteen – perhaps not even the government, although they have my records. It was my sixth foster family, and also my last. A distant memory, but Neil’s eyes told me it was still as alive as before. At that point, I started to believe his story.”


	13. Chapter 13

“Stanley, I don’t get it. If you’re so good at this game, why are you here?”

I didn’t say a thing, but Ives understood. “Something went wrong.” He said.

“It was me. I fucked up.”

“How?”

“You see, the game, it was supposed to be a secret. The game itself can be played to its full effect only when it was unknown to others. Don’t tell anyone about it – that was the agreement between us. But in the end, I told Kat.”

“Is this Kat,” Ives said, “the Kat I’m thinking of?”

I answered him with silence. “You’re still meeting her?” the FBI’s brows were furrowed into a knot, “did the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird know about this?”

“No, I don’t think he did. I never told him,” I said. “We only met in the gallery, most of the time. One time, it was because her art supplier was thrown down the stairs by her husband’s minions, and another time was when her son was sent away. She was living a life that was very desperate, and she wasn’t happy. Sator had something to hold over her, and it had been quite a long time by then. I just thought she needed help.”

“ _You thought? She needed?_ ” Ives apparently wasn’t fond of how I put it. “How much exactly did you tell Kat?”

“Only the part about exchanging our identities.”

“For God’s sake, Stanley.”

“I know. At first, I thought it wouldn’t be a big deal – Kat was the last person possible to turn us in to the police; besides, you can say that Neil and I had saved her life. But soon, she began to work on this idea – I don’t know if it was because the hatred towards Sator finally overtook her reason, or because the game that I’d divulged gave her the idea. Probably both. Long story short, she wanted to hire one of us to kill Sator. According to her explanation, her husband had pancreatic cancer, and she could easily change his pills to Rohypnol, which should give us time to do it. When it was finished, we could exchange our identities and flee; she’d prepare a boat for us, and we’d throw the body into the ocean, and no one else would know.”

Ives listened with a deep frown.

“She talked to me about this,” I said. “Drew up a blueprint. She did deliberate over every detail in it. I mean, the plan didn’t sound so bad.”

Ives shook his head. “Please tell me you said no.”

“I –” I sighed. “– I couldn’t say no in her face, so I said I’d think about it. I know what you’re going to say, you’re saying ‘I told you so’. Yes, I concur, meeting with her secretly wasn’t a good idea, I see it now. There’s a reason I always avoid letting others know about my profession: everyone has someone they want to get rid of; let’s just say two days ago I had some beers with you in your hallway, and next thing I know you’ll be ringing me to ask about killing your gardener. Who knows, probably just because the person pocketed some coins when mowing your lawn. Killing someone – people tend to think it’s easy, especially when they don’t have to take any risks. Even if it comes out, they can always turn the real murderer over to the police.”

“If you were already aware of all the risks,” he said, “why did you still think it was worth considering?”

“Because I owed her,” I said, resigned. “The game between me and another person got her involved. She would’ve been dead. Sator held a lasting grudge for that defeat, and started to treat her worse than before. I know it didn’t make sense, but I couldn’t stop thinking I was responsible for it. He began to torture her, which was because we hurt his pride.”

“So you took the job.”

“I said I’d think about it, and I did. In fact, I thought the plan was quite viable. With Kat as our inside friend, the chances of killing Sator sure increased a lot, and she would con him onto the yacht. But the job involved two people, and I had to get permission from the other first, so I talked to Neil about it. His answer was only one word: no.”

“You’d probably expected an answer like this,” Ives raised his eyebrows at me.

“Yeah, but I didn’t expect his reaction after that,” I told him. “Needless to say, he knew everything – how I was still meeting Kat, how I told Kat about the exchange of our identities, how I disclosed the game to a third person. He didn’t look surprised. But I broke the promise between us, telling someone else about the existence of the game. He saw it as a betrayal.”

Ives considered me for a while, then turned his eyes away to look at Neil’s face. “I guess you hadn’t known what you’d lost yet.”

“That was what he said,” I said. “Not in words, but with his expression, his face, his body language. I tried everything to persuade him to take the job; I’ll do it, I said, you don’t need to be the one who pulls the trigger. I even said something over the line, something that couldn’t be unsaid, like ‘I’ll take the job even without you’ or something. But whatever I tried, whatever I promised, he had the only answer for me, which was no.”

“You couldn’t talk him into it.”

“More like he wouldn’t accept the talk at all.” I sipped my whiskey, “in the end, his indifference angered me. It was like whatever I said wouldn’t make him take this job, and he didn’t think it merited consideration at all.”

“He can be really stubborn if he wants to,” Ives nodded to confirm. “Otherwise he wouldn’t be here.”

“Your argument is sound,” I crossed my legs, approving of Ives’s logic. “The talk ended really unpleasantly. I remember that when I left there, I told myself, whether with his help or not, I’d take the mission. As for the disagreement between me and the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, I thought it’d be over. About us, about the game, nothing would change. Two days later we had a meeting, and not until then did I know I was wrong, completely, utterly wrong. I told Kat about this, and he saw it as an unforgivable betrayal; the game was over, and so was every connection between us – that’s what he came to tell me.”

“Did Kat know that he was the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird?” Ives asked. “Did you tell her the Hummingbird’s identity as well?”

“Of course not,” his question perplexed me. “I wasn’t as out of my mind as that. She didn’t know who the other one was.”

“But she knew your identity,” A tipsy Ives was one step to a master of logic, “your codename, your contact details, everything.”

“Yes,” I replied reluctantly.

“So the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird naturally assumed that you told her his identity, too.”

“No, I never mentioned it,” I countered, strained. “She found it out herself. She knew the person was Neil; although she didn’t know his codename on the job, she recognized his face. I didn’t know if it was her strategy, or a way of her proving herself, to casually give out that she knew. As a matter of fact, they were all harmless motions, like a casual ‘how’s Neil?’ on the phone, or, when Neil was listening on the other end of the earpiece, she’d say, ‘say hello to Neil for me’. As the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird saw it, it was me who told her his true identity. The safety net no longer existed, as the risk had been so high as to be unbearable – those were his exact words. He decided to terminate our deal, because I leaked the secret.”

“And he came to you to talk about it?”

“More specifically, he asked me to go to a place.” I poured some liquor for myself. “It was a hotel room. If you can recall, everything had started in a room like that. And this one had a swimming pool in it, and a balcony view, too; comfortable, lavish, irrespective of what purpose it would be used for. I thought it was the way he apologized, a gift; we’d celebrate the success of our last mission, and we’d reconcile and everything’d go back to normal.”

“Was your guess right?”

“Far from it. You know, not until that moment did I realise, although I had exchanged my means of living with this person, I knew so little of him.” I emptied my glass in one go, and tilted my head. “That was his way of telling me: we were through.”

“Sounds a little sad.”

“it sure was,” I agreed. “But probably every relationship has its expiration – especially one between killers. We were supposed to meet anyway, to talk about the next mission, so I didn’t really think much of it. If he had a break-up with me like anyone else who had – like Priya, my arms supplier from Mumbai; last time we met, she scolded me for my naivety, and I sent a bullet into her skull, which was known as a break-up between criminals – I probably wouldn’t have felt too bad. I mean, I’d worry that I’d kill him inadvertently, but I wouldn’t worry about feeling too much. Ideally, you wouldn’t want an extra enemy in this world, but nothing in this world is ideal; I’ve known this ever since the year I got out of juvenile rehabilitation. You could imagine me appearing in that room, stone-hearted, unconcerned – whatever you may call it. But then what happened surprised me.”

“If it was something that’d cause a stir in the jury, you’d better not tell me,” Ives pointed out smartly, “or that law-abiding heart of mine may want to do something. Please don’t tell me that one of you kidnapped Kat or the innocent young boy.”

I looked at him accusingly for a while. “No?” Ives looked completely innocent, “then what else in the world was there that could actually surprise you?”

“See this as the last exchange, then,” I thought about it. “We exchanged our wounds.”

“I don’t understand.”

I explained with patience. “There’s an old injury in your knee, right? It’s like a nightmare when it seizes. Sudden loud noises make your head hurt – the sequela of having been faced with too many IEDs. I bet that flaring lights will raise your heart rate and slow down your movement: understandable, it comes from mental stress, common for ex-military; in your case, I’m guessing it’s from the night patrol missions in Kandahar. I have these chronic maladies, too: wounds, scars, limits of movement, flaws and deficiencies. Our enemies never saw our faces, but they were well-informed about our wounded pasts – that is what I’m talking about.”

“You saw him.”

“No, you didn’t get what I meant,” I said. “There was no one in the room, only a gun. At the moment when I opened the door, the gun was just lying on the bed awaiting me – does that look familiar to you? My first reaction was of course to go up and check on the gun. I picked the gun up, and the phone rang; so I knew that although he wasn’t in the room, he must be somewhere nearby, where he could see my every move through the window.”

“What happened next?” asked Ives.

I clenched my teeth.

_**The last exchange** _

_“Touch me,” the voice in the phone said. “What did you see?”_

_For a moment he couldn’t even answer. On the other end of the receiver, the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird described the gun like this, as if it had warmth, not some cold object in his hand. He talked about the weapon, as if it was alive, as if it could escape at any second. That curt imperative sentence made him swallow._ Touch me, _the Hummingbird said, and he used_ me _instead of_ it _, as if he was convinced that the other would know the difference. It was a Glock 17 Gen 3, its magazine half-full, and it’d been used recently, but he figured that wasn't what the other man asked for. Being questioned like this made him feel exploited, and for a brief second, bewildered anger swept across his mind. He held a careless hand half around the stock, flipping the gun over in his palms, but still couldn’t answer the question._

_“I sawed the barrel short,” finally, the familiar voice spoke by his ear again. “I have problems holding the gun with my left hand. It’s due to an old injury: my left hand’s six seconds slower than my right; it’s less precise, too. This is an old gun. Disassemble it and look at the rifling, and you’ll see what I mean. Mahir helped me add some non-slip strips around the trigger, also because my left hand tends to feel tired, and I’m afraid I might not be able to hold it in some emergency. I guess you never looked at the gun properly, so you wouldn’t know it has cracks in it, it was burnt in fire once, and it can only be paired with a specific type of suppressor. And,” the other person paused. “It was a left-handed gun.”_

_“I never noticed.” After a long silence, he said._

_“You must use your left hand on this mission. If you use the right hand, they’ll see through you immediately,” the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird said. “Because my right hand’s injured. No, don’t lie and say you’ve already known. You also don’t know that I was caught once this week, hung up and questioned for a long time, so I’ll move more slowly than usual – I specifically booked a room with a swimming pool; you can simulate the slowing-down where the drag of the water is present. I think you can do it. I’ll help you prepare.”_

_He felt the gun with his hands slowly. Indeed, his left hand found the strips, adhered to the gun manually, and roughly, too. He used this gun before, but he never noticed. He lowered his head to regard its reflected lustre, astonished, and, at the same time, a little ashamed. He wanted to open it. He heard the breath on the other end of the receiver quicken for a moment: the sound of the slide being removed was clear. He tried to hold it with his left hand. The barrel was half an inch shorter than a typical Glock, which could probably salvage the precision, but also made it difficult to tame. It was the first time he approached a gun, not to challenge, but to touch. It was like a map of past ills and deficiencies; he could see it now._

_“Make sure you apply the right amount of force,” the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird said. “’cause my left hand is slower. I suggest you practice in the pool. The gun had ballistic records – as soon as they compare the bullets, they’ll know it’s mine. It’s the only way you’ll be officially recorded as the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird. Remember, wear your watch on the other hand, otherwise they’ll know your right hand isn't injured.”_

_“I…” he swallowed. “… I didn’t know.”_

_“You knew nothing about me,” the other man said, no signs of condemnation in his voice. “Because you never saw me – even when I was right in front of you.”_

_He frowned, hands closing around the gun subconsciously. He opened his mouth, trying to retort, but he moved his lips in vain, unable to form a coherent sentence. He looked over to the windows. Perhaps, the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird was looking over at him from one of the windows across from here; perhaps, it would be the last time to even think about the name Neil, or to feel sorry about it. He put back the gun gently. Now, he couldn’t bear to look at it, couldn’t help but turn his eyes away. Its open interior was a condemnation, and he recognised the smell of a carefully tended gun._

_Close your eyes, said the other person. He obeyed, with sarcastic self-disparagement, as a means of resistance. The moment his vision sank into darkness, someone came to his back and touched him. It was soft, with a kind of certitude. Of course, The Ruby-Throated Hummingbird deceived him again, convinced him that he had been somewhere else. But this time, there was no triumph in the person’s posture, only a kind of rueful retrospection._

_“I know you can’t be down on your left knee for too long, there are two fingers on your right hand that can’t bend properly, you have partial loss of hearing in one ear, and your ribs have been broken twice. When I’m you, I’ll hold the gun like this,” the person held up his arms, adjusted his shoulders from behind him, and led him to relax his wrists, and he stood there awkwardly, shifting his weight – he wasn’t used to being touched like this, being approached so tenderly, “because you went through a tough fight this week, and you haven’t fully restored your grip strength of your right hand._

_“See?” the other person smiled, self-mocking. “I always see you.”_

_He didn’t know how to reply to that. He felt too much._

_“I’ll help you prepare for the job. The exchange will go on as planned. But this is the last time – you’ll never see me again.”_

_Tears welled up in his eyes; was it shock? He had no clue how to describe the feeling. In fact, no one had ever touched him. His body, he was so used to it as a tool for murder. And it wasn’t lust; it was care; in it was not control but some sort of understanding. He wanted to keep it, but he couldn’t even comprehend it, let alone reciprocating. He hesitated. The other man took away his sidearm. He stood there, frozen, and let the other leave the way he came, without ever telling him not to leave._

Ives’s silence stretched, as if he didn’t know how to console me.

“Though the game had ended,” I said, “I still decided to keep the promise, and kill Sator on my own. About a week later, just when I was going to do it, I opened the trunk of my car, and in it was Sator’s body that’d been soaked in sea water. The person who carried him into the trunk left a lot of blood, which made me worried, because that was definitely not Sator’s blood.”

“You think it was –” Ives said, “– the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird who did it? ’Cause then you wouldn’t have to take the risks yourself?”

“Whoever did it, I owned them one.”

“Why?” Ives made an unsympathetic joke. “Because now the game went to the part of exchanging corpses, and you didn’t like it?”

I groaned deliberately loud, pretending that I was hurt. “He never let me find him again, despite the fact that the exchanges were still going on, every one of them – yes, sometimes corpses were involved. I don’t know how to put it – I wanted to meet him, I really did. Especially after Sator’s death. I wanted to know if he was safe, and how he did it. The feeling almost drove me insane.”

“Then,” he said. “Did you find him?”

“How about you tell me first,” I turned suddenly to look in another direction. In the glass, I saw my own reflection. “who’s the person in the observation room? How long has he been helping you interrogate me?”


	14. Chapter 14

You’re drunk, Ives told me in a reassuring tone. “Why don’t you try and sleep for a while,” said he. He also said something else, deliberately trying to let me hear it. He meant, I figured, that there was no need to struggle to stay awake at a time like this.

But I didn’t follow his advice. My gaze didn’t leave the wall, either. A pane of glass covered the entire wall, and I was staring at my reflection in the glass. I couldn’t see whoever was on the other side, but they could see me.

“Stanley,” Ives said. “It’s just your paranoia. Nobody was on that side of the glass.”

I had heard him talk like this before. When? His voice was controlled, like the cops at the crime scene that kept people out. Stay behind the yellow line, Ma’am, or you’ll get hurt. Ives was talking exactly like that.

“Stanley.”

I didn’t reply. I watched the reflection, as if to try to penetrate the glass with my stare.

“Stop it,” Ives said. “Stop making a show of yourself. It’s midnight. There’s no one in the observation room.”

I turned to face the room, my gaze sweeping over the smooth glass. Ives started to fret, but I pretended I didn’t notice. He didn’t repeat what he said that no one was on the other side, but when I turned back, he was visibly relieved. I looked at him, then at Neil, and then at my own hands, lowering my head.

Suddenly, I arched my back in an awkward position, and bent over to my left. I reached a foot to keep the other chair in place, and held my sleeping friend up against the chair. The series of movements were a little clumsy with the handcuffs in the way, but I went through them steadily. When my back hit my chair again, it felt like a quarter of an hour had passed. I leaned against it, and for a long moment, didn’t move. Ives’s gaze dropped on my hand: now, there were no handcuffs anymore.

No one spoke. I smiled. He moved back silently, one hand reaching under the table, pressing on the gun on his waist. I took a serene sip of my drink, but my next gesture made the FBI agent sitting across from me jump to his feet.

I stood up.

The sound of Ives pulling off the safety became clear in an instant, but I acted like I didn’t hear it. He aimed at me easily, while I raised my head, and turned to my left. If there really were audiences in the other room, they would see me stop on this end, a deliberate six inches from the glass, so that they could get a good look at me.

In the glass, Ives’s admonitory gun-holding silhouette overlapped with my reflection. My eyes kept staring in the same direction, although there was no reply from the other side. My thoughts wandered a little. Maybe Ives was right. Maybe a person could only go this far with the aid of alcohol. Though I was far less drunk than he thought.

I didn’t look through the mirror and see anyone there, but out of the blue, like a maniac that was going to perform a one-act play on his own, I started to speak to the other side. Behind me, Ives spat, which I paid no heed to.

“You didn’t die,” I said. “Did you?”

“I suggest you sit back where you were,” said Ives coldly.

“You forged your own death,” I nodded. “I figured. But I don’t understand why you’d do that.”

“Stanley,” Ives said again. “I’m serious. Put your ass back to the chair.”

“If it’s really you,” I said, “Give me some hint. A signal, a sentence. Anything that can confirm you’re there. You have your way to do it, I know you do. Please, I need to know, it’s important to me. It can be anything, any sign, however small it is – tell me you’re there.”

“This is ridiculous,” the FBI agent said. “You’re talking to yourself. Do you know what you look like now? I say it one last time, go back where you were, Stanley, or I’ll send someone in.”

“Tell me how to get out of this conundrum,” Ives pushed a button beside the table, and my voice grew increasingly urgent, “how to escape from the accusations while saving his life. A suggestion, a warning, whatever it is, are you there? It’s not for me, not for him. It’s for yourself. If I can’t lie to myself anymore, you must’ve been unable to do so since a long time ago. I must get out of here, because –”

Two uniforms walked up behind me and held me down by my shoulders. I recognized one of them; it was the person who sent me in. Several minutes later, the door to the interrogation room closed again, and we were back at the beginning: I was at one side of the table, Ives at the other side. The difference was, the bottle between us was already empty, but the recording tape took a new start.

“The date is August 3rd. The time is 0217,” Ives said. “Present are Agent Hobbs, myself; the informant of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, codename ‘the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird’, a.k.a. Neil; and –” he looked over at me.

“Stanley Clement.”

“The killer going by the pseudonym of Stanley Clement, real name unknown,” Ives added coldly. “Date of birth unknown, codename – before his arrest – ‘the Protagonist’, for tape recording only.”

A long pause. Ives put down the pen, hands folding and resting on the opened pages of his notebook, looking at me.

“Now, listen: in the observation room is another interview, conducted at the same time as this one. This is a double interrogation, only saved for cases that we are in urgent need of answers to, or people who we really want to save. Your case was connected to another case, so we combined them, although you shouldn’t have known this. Simply speaking, the information that you disclose can possibly help with the other case,” Ives said. “Do you understand?”

But I just glanced at our reflections. “The phone call to Wheeler,” I said suddenly. “It was a signal.”

Ives stopped writing when he looked up. His gaze went slowly over my face. I heard the noise of the pen scratching across the paper.

“I can give you a rough idea of how it works,” he said, impassively looking down again. “When we take a rest, the other side starts. How much those guys get out of the other side, depends on how much I get out of you. Whether or not they’ll drop the charges against you or the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, also depends on how much I can get.”

“Great,” I praised whole-heartedly. “Who’s the one leading the other side of the interrogation?”

“You’re missing the point,” he said. “It’s not up to me. It’s up to them. You were right; someone was directing the interview. Those guys behind the glass can see everything happening here, but you and I are unable to change their decision. Think it’s unfair? So do I. But let me tell you this – don’t think so highly of yourself. You’re not the protagonist in this show. I know you think you are, but you aren’t, and never was, Mr Clement.”

“You’re just using me as a lever to –”

“Find the hostage.”

“What hostage?”

“Stanley,” Ives sighed. “We have reason to believe that you in the future kidnapped Damien Sutherland – let me finish – and we have good reason to believe that he came back and kidnapped Sutherland’s son, just to get you off. Now, if you help us find the hostage, we can probably consider not charging you.”

“Not good enough,” I said. “for my help, you have to offer something better.”

“Forty minutes ago, he admitted to having killed the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird and faked his own death,” Ives spoke quickly, without wasting any time. “Is this offer good enough? He killed one of them, slipped and let the other escape, who was the one you’ve been dealing with. And this one was badly injured for your sake. Let us put it this way: helping us is helping yourself. You don’t know what kind of person you will have become.”

“Are you finished?” I leaned in, making sure Ives saw the look in my eyes. “I don’t believe you.”

A long silence. Ives put back the pen cap, and knocked on the table. Moments later, someone entered the password, opening the door. I looked over at the doorway. The moment of the heavy door being pushed open contrasted sharply with the utter silence in the hallway.

“For the record only: 0237,” Ives told the machine. “Agent McLean entered the interrogation room.”

Barbara put down the thing, nodded at Ives without looking at me, and left. After she had got out, I inhaled and sat up straight again. Ives took out a piece of paper from the folder she sent in, and pushed it to me. The image was processed, taken by a security camera, and this time, I recognized the person in the photo. “This is Damien,” Ives said. “Damien Sutherland, son of Michael Sutherland, your client, although he doesn't look very recognizable now. See the time in the lower right corner? It’s captured from the video material we received six hours ago, not long after he disappeared.”

I said nothing. He pushed another thing toward me. “This,” he said, “is the report from the pathologist. It itemizes the details of your killer friends’ death. Yes, it comes from the future; no, we usually won’t disclose this kind of information, but Crosby – sorry, I mean your old pal Michael – decided to make an unprecedented exception for you. Photos may be deceptive, and the testimony I read to you may be false, but this is a pathology report. I couldn’t have forged something like this even if I had the audacity. Just when CPS was going to use it to sue you, you faked your own death. It isn’t very honorable, right? If you didn’t kill him, why did you run away?”

I wasn’t going to answer the question. He shrugged. He gestured, and a photograph was pulled up and projected in front of me. “And the last item,” his lowered voice was tinged with irritation, “is how it looked like when the corpse was found. We are not going to charge you with something that hasn't happened yet, Stanley, it’s something the other person in the other room has to face. I just want you to know you still have the chance to change everything – if you want.”

I took another breath. In front of me, the projection of the other man was blurred due to zooming in. Ever since I met the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, he’d used a lot of aliases, but never before had he been so simply called a corpse. I knew now why Ives had to wait until he fell asleep to ask about all of this. I stared at the bloodstain in the photo.

“Two conditions,” I said. “Let him get the treatment, and don’t let him know that the future me is in the back room.”

“Doctors are on their way here.”

“And,” I didn’t wait for Ives’s question before saying, “I need a lawyer.”

“You gave up that right yourself, remember?” Ives reminded me. “When your interrogation started, you told me you didn’t need a prosecuting lawyer, because – and I quote directly from you – ‘I can defend myself’.”

“Well, I've changed my mind. You want answers? Then I want my lawyer. The next thing I’m doing won’t happen without a lawyer present. Find a prosecuting lawyer, Ives, whichever available at this hour,” I toyed with the handcuffs. “Because I am going to tell you what happened that night. Listen closely: I killed Michael Sutherland.”

The interrogation room was so quiet that you could hear a pin drop. Ives looked at me. “Also,” I said, “this isn’t him.”

“What?”

“Ask him where he’d hidden the real Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, because whoever this burnt body was, it wasn’t the Hummingbird.” I tilted my head to the other side. “Let me tell you something – killers are also experts at faking deaths. Now, whatever made our friend willing to take the risks to run away into the past, it isn’t death, right? I have a feeling that it’s something more terrifying than death. What is it? That you can’t leave him, or that he can’t stop the game? Answer me.”

“I think we’d better take a rest,” Ives was speaking. “Sit tight: your lawyer will show up.”

He stood up and pushed away the chair. I watched him leave the table and reach a hand to the door. Suddenly, some static noise of a microphone came from my left. It lasted for a while, like someone stifling a rabbit with a cloth bag. A button had been pressed down in the other room, or someone had gotten rid of the handcuffs just like I did. The unfiltered noise splashed over my face, went silent for a moment, then got twisted into a thin thread. It was him; it was his signal. My heartbeat almost went out of control, although I kept a calm face at the outside. Then, there came a man’s voice.

“RUN.” He said. 


	15. Chapter 15

I lit a cigarette, and didn’t speak until the legal aid lawyer who was sent in put down his briefcase.

“I wasn’t going to run. And about the Sutherland case, whatever you want to know, I can tell you.”

“Where’s the gun?”

“In my foster father’s old house. He was living in the Emeline lane, the one near Loughton. I always keep some of my ‘tools’ in his tool shed. Ever since he died, the place’s never been renovated: there’s still plenty of room.”

“Tell us the model of the gun.”

“A Barrett,” I said. “M110 would be ideal, but you guys are always keeping a close eye on that kind of product, and I didn’t want your attention to be drawn to it. No, it was a Barrett. Recoil operated, not semi-automobile. I like to do it myself. You don’t know what I’m talking about, right? Ask Ives, he’s extremely familiar with the gun.”

The new-comer looked up and cast a glance at Ives, then at me. “Talk about what happened that night, Stanley.”

“You don’t need to,” my lawyer chimed in.

“No, but I want to,” I flicked off the ash, and flashed a smile at the new guy. “Let me think about where to begin – my original target was just the safe box, gents. My plan couldn’t be simpler: sneak into Sutherland’s house, get the thing inside the box, then leave. Yeah, I managed to get it open, but it took way longer than I’d expected. Sutherland came downstairs and saw my face – I was supposed to panic, right? But just then I saw the incense burner on his nightstand and noticed the newspapers underneath it as well, which gave me an idea. I knew the best place to set up a sniper rifle, because I knew the place like the back of my hand. All I needed to do was to wait till it was dark and quiet, when the guards were changing shifts and Sutherland was asleep, to aim at his window. That is the full confession: I left after the fire went up; no one saw me.”

“Are you finished?” Ives said.

I nodded.

“Bullshit.” He said. “What about the injured shoulder?”

I shrugged: “They were mistaken.”

“Sutherland’s guards – plural, I mind you – swore they’d hit the thief.”

“They were mistaken.”

“What was in the box?”

“No comment.”

“Why set off the security alarm at the gate?”

“No comment.”

“You kill people for a living, Stanley,” Ives didn’t offer me time to breathe; his barrage of questions made the other person in the room freeze. “Something this trivial couldn’t upset you. Not to mention Sutherland didn’t know you at all – the he-saw-you situation has always been your one-sided story, with no one else to prove it. Even if he did see you, do you want us to believe that’s why you went back and committed murder?”

“It was nothing trivial,” I didn’t even blink. “He recognized me. He’d probably tell the police about me.”

“Bullshit,” Ives countered bluntly. “Then let me ask you: why did it have to be on the same night?”

“What?”

“He saw you, you had to kill him, which I admit is very logical, but you could by all means have waited for several days, couldn’t you? Wouldn’t it be better to do it until his guard was down, until you were more prepared? You’d already alerted the guards, he’d step his security up – why did you have to do it on that night?”

My answer – which was no answer – seemed to satisfy Ives.

“Admit it,” he said. “It wasn’t you who stole the content in that safe box.”

“It could be I had to take him out before he called the police.”

“Michael Sutherland was an old person, Stanley. He was what we talk about when we talk about ‘old money’. You know what that means? He was used to people being busy around him, not the other way around. If I were him, right after a shock for nothing, I would just lie down first and think about it tomorrow. I was old pals with the police chief anyway, what was the point of reporting immediately? Unless what was missing was so important to Sutherland that he couldn’t rest until he got it back; whoever broke into his box must have known it, so they must kill him on the night.”

“No comment.”

“So let’s say we believe you,” Ives said. “How do you explain those sleeping pills, huh? And your killer friend – the wound on his shoulder happens to match the description, while you insist that the guards had made a mistake?”

“It’s not news that killers get hurt.”

“Yeah?” Ives said. “So if I take the bullet taken out of his shoulder and check it with the gun fired by Sutherland’s guard that night, I won’t get a match? And how did he know Damien Sutherland?”

“You’re bluffing, you didn’t have that bullet at all. You couldn’t connect him with the case at all, otherwise you would have sued him already. Listen, you want to know how Old Sutherland died, which I’ve told you. Find the gun, find the bullet, and my story could be checked. Could there be more conclusive evidence than that?”

“Actually,” said the new agent, “he’s right.” Ives gave him a withering glare.

“What you should do now, is to find the gun. The sooner you find the gun, the sooner you can enjoy my absence. Because, the closer you come to the evidence for the Sutherland case,” I paused, “the more likely the other me in the other room will spit out the whereabouts of his hostage. So what are you guys waiting for? Call the judge, get a search warrant, and send people to the house. I’m as desperate to close the case as you are, and I know the future me best. He doesn't want me to be convicted as far as I know, and he’ll do anything about it, although I still haven’t figured out why.”

“About that,” said the new agent, “he’s right too.”

“See?” I finished in one breath, “I was helping as much as I could. You wanted me to confess having killed Sutherland, and I did it as told, you wanted me to help find the hostage, and I did it too. Can’t believe me? That’s your problem.”

“For a person who had just known that he got played, you acted far too calmly,” this was Ives speaking, “they think you’ve gone soft, Stanley, that you’ve given up. But they don’t know you bastard, you don’t admit defeat this easily, and you don’t give up easily. The guy in the back room has warned you, taking all the risks, but you’re not running. Not only are you not running, you’re confessing, and you’re helping me to find the hostage.”

I flashed my smile at him. “Maybe I’m tired of being dictated.”

“Tired of being dictated,” Ives leaned down and looked into my eyes, “or just planning on something else?”

“Agent,” the new guy chimed in amiably. “The instruction we got was to get him to confess, and he had made the admission that he killed Sutherland. The case has been closed. You’ve spent a lot of time on this. Time to take a break.”

“Carlton.” Ives said.

But Carlton was already on his feet, having sorted out the files. He knocked the pieces of paper on the table so they were neatly arranged. Then he bent down and pressed the stop button on the recorder. He looked at me and Ives tolerantly.

“We’ll transfer you to custody while we call for a search warrant. The rest, Ives, is not for you or me to interfere. The interrogation ended at 0326, a joint decision of Agents Carlton and Hobbs; Stanley Clement will be transferred to custody, and the FBI informant, codename Ruby-Throated Hummingbird, will be placed in protective custody, pending further court trials. Do you have anything to add, lawyer?”

My lawyer shook his head. “Carlton.” Ives said again, his voice raised. But Carlton had already turned around, pushed away his chair, and was walking towards the door. He seemed to suddenly remember something after he had turned the doorknob. One hand placed on the door, he turned to face me courteously, his jaw raised. Ives seemed to be trying his best to restrain his anger.

“Before today, I heard a lot about you, Stanley, but as I see it, or as the people in the other room see it: you’re not as smart as Ives claims you are.” He paused, mocking eyes passed over me, the over Ives. “Perhaps it’s a good thing, or they won’t send me.”

I whispered something to the lawyer, who nodded. When he turned to the other two people in the room, Carlton was already stepping out the door. He coughed, as if he had to suppress a laugh but failed: “My client asks that you wait for a moment.”

Carlton stopped at the words. The condescendence on his face was gone; the young new-comer regarded me suspiciously, but I ignored him. At last, it was Ives who broke the silence in the room: “For what?”

His sudden question made the lawyer startle. The mug in the latter’s hand shook a little, and the kind of coffee that was only available in this place – from the vending machine at the end of the corridor – spilled out a little, almost falling on the papers by his hand. He was a wimp who couldn’t answer Ives’s question. He looked at me.

“You’re very lucky.” I turned to the new agent. “Carlton, right? Your colleagues should already be seeing them on the monitor: the doctor and his helper on their way here. The pair are on the elevator now, and one of them has the medical kit in hand. Five more minutes, and they’ll be here. Why did I say you were lucky? You never had the actual combat experience, I guess. In a place like this, it’s difficult to dodge a bullet – but very easy to hit a person. If you leave now, you won’t be here when the doctor and his helper arrive. That’s why you’re lucky. Want some advice? If you haven’t left by then? Don’t let them in.”

“What on earth are you talking about?” The young agent shouted.

“– Because he’s not a doctor, and his partner isn’t a doctor's assistant either,” I said. “How could the things in their hands pass the security check, I can’t tell you. There’s only one thing you need to know; what I say next is very important for you. You’ve turned off the recorder, right? The people in the other room can’t hear what we’re saying? Swear to me.”

Carlton looked instinctively over at Ives, who was staring at me sternly. Carlton nodded at last, timorous.

“Give me sixty seconds. Pretend that you’re listening to me talking about something of great importance.” I said. “Mahir will be counting the seconds; you just need to take care of everything else. As soon as the time is up, you’ll breathe in the sleeping gas and pass out, but it’s at least better than being killed by a bullet. When the two people open the door, they’ll discover that Neil and I have already left the room, so they won’t slaughter anyone here, you get what I’m saying? Now, Mahir, start counting.” Carlton discovered in shock that I was talking to my lawyer, because the latter lowered his head to look at his watch. “As for you, drink your coffee, don’t leave it cold, and tell me the model of the lock downstairs.”

“You can’t open that lock.” Everything about this seemed to confuse Carlton profoundly. My lawyer had been a yes-man when he first walked in the door, his suit and suitcase rumpled, all the appearances of resignation. But now, he had turned into another person.

“That, you don’t need to worry about.” I told Carlton.

“Forty-five seconds,” said Mahir.

Away from Carlton, I turned to face the other man. “I think you know the quickest way to leave, Ives.”

Ives shrugged. “I can lead you out,” he said, “but what about him? The medication put him to sleep.”

“No, it didn’t.” I winked at Ives with one eye. “You never saw with your own eyes that he swallowed the pills.”

Ives’s eyes narrowed in an instant. “What do you mean?”

“Thirty-five seconds,” said Mahir.

There was a scathing curse and a nervous gulp, almost simultaneous, the former coming from Ives, and the latter from Carlton. I, and the other person asleep in the chair, were the only ones uninfiltrated by the tension. Carlton’s eyes darted back and forth between the door and me, as if he was calculating how at risk his career would be if he ran now, and whether it was worth him dying. Ives was studying the other killer, whilst I reached a hand to pour myself a glass of wine. I thought it was a sad waste for the good brandy to be left behind, though no one shared the sentiment.

“You are able to leave right now. You must have a reason for still staying.” Ives said. “What for?”

I sipped the liquor, smiling at him absent-mindedly. I put down the bottle, and raised the glass to the person on the other side of the glass.

“Fifteen seconds,” Mahir said, standing up, our eyes meeting, “time to start.”

I snapped my fingers, and the person lying in his chair sprang to his feet. There was not a single trace of lethargy in his face. He strode past Carlton towards the light switches of the room, pushed at some of the buttons, and darkness fell shortly in our room, while the other room in front of us was presented in unreserved revelation. Crosby was dialling a number, frantic from frustration, and Barbara’s face was taut, unmoving with her hands in her pockets, as if demanding me to explain the matter. The local detective who had arrested me, and the people from FBI in charge of the case of the missing hostage, were all standing behind the glass, suddenly lit by the unexpected light. Carlton pulled out a gun with a trembling hand; Ives muttered a curse, and knocked him to the ground; behind them, Mahir told me, urgent, that there were only ten seconds left, and started to hand out the gas masks from his suitcase.

Everything became slow-motion: Carlton’s fall, the sleeping gas surging in, and the door opened by the other killer. Behind me there was a scuffle, at some moment there was even someone uttering my name; Ives tried to contain the other person but ended up losing his own gun to him, which was – I had no idea – either because he was slowed by the sleeping gas, or because he finally decided to let us go. Time was up; the time would soon pass; but I kept staring at another face behind the glass, whose owner stared back, as if no other people were around, his eyes filled with complicated emotions. When the other person walked up behind me, mutely urging me to leave the room, the two similar faces overlapped in the glass.

I watched, with one final, lingering look. _Now,_ I thought, _we’re finally even._

Ives was driving; Mahir was listening in on the police radio for news on staff deployment; and I broke the silence.

“Thanks – I know you wasn’t dumb enough to let someone snatch your gun, Ives.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ives said, his face cold.

“Now, everyone thinks you’re held by the Protagonist. You’ve been forced to become the hostage of two killers.” I said, still smiling. “It’s in your best interest. You can just drop us off, when we get to the hospital.”

“What they’ll find at the address won’t be your Barrett, right?” Ives thought for a while. “What is it?”

“Everything that was once in Sutherland’s safe box,” I said. “Evidence for the real existence of the club. Photos, audio records, testimonies of the witnesses. I put everything in there. Don’t worry, there were copies for backup.”

He shook his head. “Sometimes I feel I don’t know you at all,” he said, grim. “Or myself.”

His words made me think of something, something I hadn’t had the chance to inquire into. I glanced at the other killer, to see him nodding at me. “I’ve been meaning to ask,” I said. “In the interrogation room, why didn’t you reveal that we had exchanged identities?” Mahir stopped what he was doing, as if he also wanted to know the answer.

“That’s a good question,” after a pause, Ives said. “A really, really good question, Neil.”


End file.
